Black Bottom Lemon Pie

I first came across this recipe in a copy of the 1932 Woodward and Lothrop Cookbook and Kitchen Guide for the Busy Woman in the library of Sandy Spring Museum in Sandy Spring, Maryland, where I was doing fieldwork at the time. The cookbook, written by Mabel Claire, was of local publication, as Woodward and Lathrop was a Washington, D.C. department store, first opening in 1887. The implication of the subtitle, according to author of The American History Cookbook Mark Zanger, was that these recipes were for the woman who worked outside of the home, kept no garden, nor had much stockpiled in the way of stored, preserved food. She was likely a city-dweller, and was also living in the midst of the Great Depression. Hence, this collection offers recipes that are generally quick and thrifty, calling for a modest number of ingredients and none too fancy. The cookbook does make up for this frugality by offering innovative recipes, as evidenced in the lemon-chocolate pairing in this Black Bottom Lemon Pie.



The classic Black Bottom Pie features a chocolate bottom layer, covered with vanilla custard, and sometimes topped with whipped cream. This version is said to have originated in southern California, first appearing in print in the 1928 Los Angeles Times. I couldn't find much about the origins of Black Bottom Pie with a lemon layer, but four years later, Mabel Claire included it in her cookbook, calling it a "New taste thrill-- chocolate in lemon meringue pie. It's a gourmet treat." Today, the pie has been popularized by Emily and Melissa Elsen of 4 and 20 Blackbirds, who offer it in their Brooklyn shop and include a recipe in their cookbook.

Here, I stuck closely to Claire's version, adding some cornstarch to thicken the yellow custard, and including more specific directions-- particularly for blind baking and refrigeration (the original did not call for it). What I certainly kept, and what may be the most ingenious part of the recipe is the lattice meringue, a style I've never found elsewhere.

Black Bottom Lemon Pie

Adapted from The Woodward and Lothrop Cookbook and Kitchen Guide for the Busy Woman

Ingredients

Nothing in the House pie crust, halved

2 ounces semisweet chocolate

4 eggs, separated

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

3 Tablespoons water

1 teaspoon lemon peel 

1 cup sugar

2 Tablespoons cornstarch

Directions

For the crust:
1. Prepare half of Nothing in the House pie crust as per the directions, reserving the leftover egg for an egg wash and saving other half of the recipe in the freezer for a future pie. Chill dough at least one hour before rolling and fitting into a greased and floured 9-inch pie pan. Prick crust with fork all over the bottom. Place pie pan in the freezer for 1 hour to set before baking. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Remove crust from freezer, line with parchment paper and fill with pie weights or dried beans. Blind bake crust for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, remove paper and weights and brush with egg wash. Return crust to oven and bake for 5-8 more minutes more or until fully baked, puffed, and golden brown. Let cool while you prepare the filling.

For the filling:
1. Melt chocolate over hot water in the top of a double boiler.  Spread evenly over the bottom of the baked and cooled pie shell and set aside.

2. In the top of a double boiler, beat egg yolks until thick. Add lemon juice and water, mixing well to combine. Stir in lemon peel, 1/2 cup of sugar, and cornstarch. Cook over hot (not boiling) water, stirring constantly until thick, about 15 minutes. Remove from water and heat and let cool.

3. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. In a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat egg whites until frothy. Add remaining 1/2 cup sugar gradually, beating constantly until stiff glossy peaks form. Fold half of the egg white mixture into the egg yolk mixture until combined and pour over chocolate bottom in pie shell.

4. Spoon remaining egg white mixture into pastry tube and make a lattice design on top of the lemon filling.

5. Bake in oven for 10-15 minutes or until meringue is lightly browned. Let cool to room temperature and chill in refrigerator at least 1 hour before serving. Enjoy!

Related recipes:
Black Bottom Pie
Lemon Chess Pie
Lemon Meringue Pie
Lemon Meringue Pie Cake
Levon Helm's Lemon Icebox Pie

Cranberry Sage Pie

Braided edges, abstract lattices, and golden brown sugared tops, Four & Twenty Blackbirds pies are real visual stunners and the women who make them-- sisters Emily and Melissa Elsen-- are pioneers of beautiful and creative crust designs.

But equally as innovative are the recipes the two dream up, which spiral out from the classics into new flavor combinations like Maple Lime Custard, Rosemary Honey Shoefly, and the drink-turned-pie Buttered Rum Cream. They call the recipes in their new The Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book "uncommon" and it's true-- while the book does offer an ample selection of old standbys, their puissance lies in their knack for creative innovation, both in visual design and flavor.

This talent makes sense considering their background-- Emily is an art school graduate and the two sisters grew up in a family restaurant run by their mother and aunts in a small town in the midwest. Their grandmother baked the pies.

The sisters started their own food business in 2009-- a pie-to-order start-up run out of their Brooklyn apartment-- and by 2010 they had opened the doors of their brick and mortar pie shop in Gowanus. Though their pie recipes have been featured in numerous magazines and sites, at the end of last year they put out their first (I'm thinking there might eventually be another?) cookbook to much acclaim.



Though I'd made a few of their recipes before (see their Salty Honey Pie and Rhubarb Pie) I was was excitedly waiting for their cookbook for months, knowing it would become a resource I'd return to again and again, to bake my way through the recipes and to provide creative inspiration for my own crust designs and flavor combinations.

I stared off with something fairly basic but really good--their Cranberry Sage Pie-- which I made for Christmas dinner this past year. Aside from my everlasting love for cranberries, it was the perfect pie for the occasion with it's holiday-appropriate red hue and sage which adds a savory note that mimicks some of the other flavors of the dinner. We ate ours (along with Pecan Pie and a Dark Chocolate Whiskey-Soaked Bundt Cake) around the fire after opening presents and while highly anticipating the posting of the Downton Abbey Season 4 Christmas Special by the generous Brits.

Cranberry Sage Pie
Adapted from The Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Book

Ingredients
Nothing in the House pie crust
3/4 cup dried cranberries
1 tablespoon fresh sage, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
4 tablespoons arrowroot (cornstarch also works)
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
4 cups whole cranberries, fresh or frozen
1 small baking apple (I used a Northern Spy)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 large egg, lightly beaten
Egg wash (1 large egg whisked with 1 teaspoon water and a pinch of salt)
Demerara sugar, for dusting

Directions
1. Prepare the Nothing-in-the-House pie crust as per the directions. Chill dough at least 1 hour. Once chilled, roll out 1/2 of pie crust and fit into a 9-inch greased and floured pie pan. You can choose to roll out the top-crust now and refrigerate it flat, or roll it out once you've prepared the filling. Either way, you should put both the remaining crust and the pie pan in the fridge while you prepare the filling. Reserve half-egg yolk for the egg wash.

2. In a heatproof bowl, pour boiling water over the dried cranberries to cover by about 1 inch. Allow them to plump while you prepare the rest of the filling.

3. In a food processor fitted with the blade attachment, combine the chopped sage, granulated and brown sugars, salt, arrowroot (or cornstarch), cinnamon, and allspice. Process until the sage is fully blended. Pour the sugar mixture into a large bowl and set aside.

4. Use the same food processor bowl to briefly process 2 cups of the whole cranberries until they are roughly chopped. Add them, along with the remaining 2 cups of whole cranberries, to the sugar mixture.

5. Peel the apple and shred on the large holes of a box grater. In a colander, drain the plumped dried cranberries of excess water, but do not press or squeeze them out. Add the shredded apple and the drained dried cranberries to the bowl with the rest of the filling and stir to combine. Stir in the vanilla extract and egg and mix well. Pour the filling into the refrigerated pie shell and top with the remaining rolled pastry, using a lattice design if desired. Flute and seal edges.

6. Chill the pie in the fridge for 10-15 minutes to set the pastry. Meanwhile preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Brush the pastry with the egg wash to coat. Sprinkle with demerara sugar.

7. Place pie on the lowest rack of the oven on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake for 20-25 minutes until the pastry is set and beginning to brown. Lower the oven temperature to 375 degrees F, move the pie to the center rack and continue to bake until the crust is a deep golden brown and the filling is bubbling, 35-45 minutes longer.

8. Let cool completely on a wire rack 2-3 hours. Serve slightly warm or at room temperature with a scoop of whipped cream or vanilla ice cream, if desired.

Related recipes:
Cranberry Chess Pie
Cranberry Goat Cheese Tart with Almond Shortbread Crust
Cranberry-Lime Galette
Rhubarb Pie
Salty Honey Pie

For more on Four & Twenty Blackbirds, read my interview with Emily & Melissa here.

Four and Twenty Blackbirds Pie on The Hairpin!

Last month, for National Pie Day (not to be confused with International Pi(e) Day, coming in March), Elizabeth and I had a piece on one of my most favorite sites on the interwebs, The Hairpin! It's an illustrated history of the fabled "4 and 20 Blackbirds Pie" which appears in the Mother Goose rhyme Sing a Song of Sixpence. This piece, which features some of my mose favorite illustrations from Elizabeth yet (those blackbirds!), was also the reason that I made that rather odd Stargazy Quail Pie (so THAT explains it!). You can visit the original post on The Hairpin, and read all the lovely and funny (and spam, unfortunately) comments here, but it's also posted below (though sans comments), in case you don't want your web surfing experience to turn into a "diverting Hurley-Burley".

Though there are a few days that claim to be THE “Day of Pie”-- the U.S. House of Representatives recognized “Pi Day” on March 14th, and a second somewhat dubiously decreed “National Pie Day” on December 1st, according to the American Pie Council, today, January 23rd is the actual “National Pie Day.” It was probably chosen so that people have at least one thing to look forward to after the pie-promises of Thanksgiving and Christmas have faded, and you’re left cold and hungry in the depths of mid-winter.

In honor, of this, we present an illustrated investigation and recipe of the legendary 4 and 20 Blackbirds Pie.

We all know the nursery rhyme, Sing A Song of Sixpence, from the classic Mother Goose. This is the first verse of the rhyme as it first appeared in print in the mid-1700s.

Sing a Song of Sixpence,
A bag full of Rye,
Four and twenty
Naughty boys,
Bak’d in a Pye.

In its subsequent publication in 1780, these additional verses were added and the “naughty boys” were replaced by blackbirds.

When the pie was opened,
The birds began to sing;
Was not that a dainty dish,
To set before the king?

The king was in his counting-house,
Counting out his money;
The queen was in the parlor,
Eating bread and honey.

The maid was in the garden,
Hanging out the clothes;
There came a blackbird
And snapped off her nose.

It’s entirely unclear how those twenty-four devious boys all turned themselves into blackbirds, but one cannot know the ways of the devil. We do know that somehow they managed to and are thus transformed for the rest of all history. Though “four and twenty” may seem a random number to us now, it is actually the most frequently appearing number in Mother Goose, representing, perhaps the 24 hours in a day, or a double dozen, 12 being a fabled number in religion and mythology. “A bag full [of Rye]” may have been an actual culinary measurement, like the teaspoon and tablespoon of today. And though there’s no rye mentioned, blackbirds inside a pie could be a reference to this recipe containing live birds, from the 1549 Italian cookbook Epulario or The Italian Banquet by Giovanni de Roselli, translated into English in 1598.

TO MAKE PIE THAT THE BIRDS MAY BE ALIVE IN THEM, AND FLIE OUT WHEN IT IS CUT UP

Make the coffin of a great Pie or pasty. in the bottome whereof make a hole as big as your fist, or bigger if you will. let the sides of the coffin be some what higher then ordinary Pie, which dome. put is full of flower and bake it, and being baked, open the hole in the bottome and take out the flower [flour]. then having a Pie of the bignesse of the hole in the bottome of the coffin aforesaid. you shal put it into the coffin, withall put into the said coffin round about the aforesaid pie as many small live birds as the empty coffin will hold besides the pie aforesaid. And this is to be done at such time as you send the Pie to the table, and set before the guests: where uncovering or cutting up the lid of the great Pie, all the Birds will flie out. which is to the delight and pleasure shew to the company and because they shall not bee altogether mocked, you shall cut open the small pie and in this sort tart you may make many others, the like you may do with a Tart.

This type of surprise pie, or coffin, as they were called, was likely actually made, being related to a genre of Medieval food called solteties, which used illusions in sugar (sound familiar?) and other stunts to impress guests. The live bird pie is later referred to in 1723 by John Nott, cook to the Duke of Bolton, as an antiquated practice with the aim that the birds in flight would extinguish the candles lighting the dining hall and create “a diverting Hurley-Burley amongst the Guests in the Dark”!

Though this sort of wild Hurley-Burley sounds like the makings for a perfect Saturday night, it may not currently be culturally acceptable to insert small life birds into desserts as aforesaid. In lieu of sending you on a wild pigeon chase, here are some ways you can put a bird on it in the modern day:

-DO use a pie bird! A ceramic funnel, usually in the shape of a bird, which you insert in the middle of a pie to let steam and juices escape.

-DO create birds out of paper or modeling clay, attach them to skewers and insert them into the pie.

-DO cut bird silhouettes out of paper and place them on the pie crust, then dust the entire crust with powdered sugar, letting only the bird shapes remain un-sugared.

-DO (If you dare) make a Stargazy Quail Pie! Recipe here. WARNING: Not for vegetarians or the faint of heart.

-DON’T mold blackbirds out of pie crust dough and bake them in the pie. You will end up with deranged Calvin and Hobbes snowmen-type figures (the 24 naughty boys return!) when the butter melts. Believe me, I’ve tried.

Sources: The Annotated Mother Goose by William Baring-Gould via the American Folklife Center

Salty Honey Pie

Salt 'n' caramel, salt 'n' chocolate, buttered popcorn ice cream with bacon and pecans (believe!). Salted sweets are so in right now. I've fallen in to the fad too because you know what, it's delicious (I'm making salted caramels for Christmas gifts--spoiler alert!!).  I saw this recipe on the South Brooklyn Post from the Four & Twenty Blackbirds Pie Shop in Gowanus, and thought it sounded like a different (yet familiar, see maple pie, and sugar pie) yummy take on the sweet 'n' salt. Oh boy, it was. Here's my version.

Salty Honey Pie
adapted from Four & Twenty Blackbirds

Ingredients
Nothing in the House pie crust, halved
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
3/4 cup white sugar
2 tablepsoons white or yellow cornmeal
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
3/4 cup honey (I used raw, local honey)
3 large eggs, beaten
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla paste (or extract, in a pinch)
1 or 2 tablespoons flake sea salt for finishing (pink salt looks quite nice!)

Directions
1. Prepare half of Nothing in the House pie crust as per the directions, reserving leftover egg for an egg wash. Chill dough at least one hour before rolling and fitting into a greased and floured 9-inch pie pan. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Mix melted butter, sugar, salt, and cornmeal to form a thick paste. Add honey, vanilla, and vinegar, then beaten eggs and cream. Blend well by hand or with an electric mixer.  Pour filling into pie shell, flute crust (or apply crust design) and brush on an egg wash. Bake  for 50-60 minutes or until fillings is puffed, only slightly wobbly in the middle, and golden brown on top. Cool for one hour. Sprinkle with flake sea salt and serve with whipped cream, if desired.



For the crust design, I cut leaves using a Williams-Sonoma crust cutter I got at a local church sale, and overlapped them, securing them to the bottom crust with an egg wash. To make sure they stayed put in the oven, I froze the crust for about 30 minutes before adding the filling and baking.

Gotta say, this pie is sooo goood. The top of the filling gets a bit crusty, while underneath it is smooth and oozy, like a creme brûlée. The small amount of cornmeal gives it a little grit, and I was pleasantly surprised that it was not too too sweet (I mean it does consist mostly of honey), but more smooth and floral.

For the salt flakes on top, I used Himalayan pink and white, which adds a nice contrast. I took the pie to a music party and potluck with some new friends and strangers.

Related:

An Interview with Emily and Melissa Elsen of Four and Twenty Blackbirds