The Friday Pie Slice

Happy Friday! Please enjoy this first Friday Pie Slice of the NEW YEAR.

1st slice. I've been so inspired lately by the photographs and baked goods of Tara Jensen of Smoke Signals Baking in Marshall, North Carolina. Visit her website and view her beautiful tumblr/instagram feed.

2nd slice. My friend Shauna Lott just successfully completed a kickstarter drive to fund The Long I Pie Shop-- a mobile bakery with a social justice mission in Denver, Colorado. Can't wait to see all the goodness that comes out of this project. Check out my interview with Shauna and her recipe for Apple, Brie & Prosciutto Pie here.

3rd slice. One way I kept warm during THE POLAR VORTEX was by making a wintery mix of songs for cold and blizzardy weather, including Hardanger fiddle and other Scandinavian styles, songs, fingerstyle guitar, and a little psychedelia. You can download it here.

The tasty crumbs. Elizabeth Graeber did the above sketch of Kate Lebo & me at our reading and pie tasting at Trohv back in September. Elizabeth and I are working up a new collaboration this weekend--stay tuned!

Find past Friday Pie Slices here.

The Friday Pie Slice

1st slice. I spent the past few days baking, talking shop, and running about town with the lovely and inspiring Kate Lebo (pictured above), whose volume of poetry, recipes, and ephemera A Commonplace Book of Pie is fresh off the presses! Catch the fun trailer for the book here.

2nd slice. Though it came out a few month's back, my friend Lora just reminded me of artist Debbie Grossman's My Pie Town, a reimagining of Russell Lee's 1940 photographs of Pie Town, New Mexico, that plays with gender, history, and notions of Americana. Very cool.

3rd slice. Ashley Melzer and I were pleasantly surprised this week when Garden & Gun listed our short doc The Wharf, about DC's Maine Ave. Fish Market in their list of five favorite Southern Foodways Alliance Greenhouse films! Honored to be included in this fine company.

The tasty crumbs. "I think food is so amazing because it's such a powerful voice. But it really brings to voice the once-silenced voices. I think of the women who all through time in Southern history, their hands and minds have really deeply shaped Southern cuisine." My mentor and UNC American Studies professor Marcie Ferris, talking women's influence on Southern food on last weekend's episode of The Splendid Table.

Stacks Upon Stacks of Pie Plates

A Apple Pie

While researching archival pie images and literature, as I am wont to do, I came across this version of a nursery rhyme A Apple Pie, estimated to be from 1870, and published by Kronheim & Company. This nursery rhyme seems to have missed me as a a child, but maybe some of you know it? Here's the illustrations, though you can see a pdf of the entire book here.

A apple pie  B bit it  C cut it  D dealt it  E eat it  F fought for it  G got it  H hid it  I (invisible?)  

J joined it  K kept it  L longed for it  M mourned for it  N nodded at it  O opened it  P peeped at it 

Q quartered it  R ran for it  S stole it  T took it  U (understated?)  V viewed it  W wanted it

XYZ& amperse and all wished for a piece in hand.

I think my favorite is the girl (Q) using the compass to exactly quarter the pie, though the baby (B) taking a bite and dogs (F...foxes?) fighting for it are also quite humorous. I also came across this edition, c. 1886/1900 (?), by Kate Greenaway. More about her classic and slightly different version coming soon...

3 Nights of Blackberry Desserts

During my last week at Rokeby, Howie discovered a plentiful blackberry bramble behind the white house. It was probably the most fruitful berry patch I have ever foraged from, and the fruits of our labor yielded 3 nights of blackberry desserts. First we enjoyed a blackberry-ginger cobbler.
For the biscuit topping I used a recipe for "Yankee Biscuits" I got from Clara. It is as follows:
Yankee Biscuits
3 c. flour
2 Tblsp. sugar
2 Tblsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. salt
1 stick cold butter
1 1/2 c. cold milk

Combine dry, cut in butter until consistency of cornmeal & peas. Add milk, stir gently. Place on floured board and knead 14 times. Roll out into 1-inch. Cut and bake for 15 minutes in 425 degree oven.
I just rolled out the biscuit topping, and placed it on top of the blackberry filling, which I had poured into a cake pan. We enjoyed it a la mode, after Louis' delicious fish stew. The second night, I made a blackberry rustic tart, topped with Sam Comfort's honey from Anarchy Apiaries. It was basically a pie with a thrown-together/less-artful crust. And for the last night and a Big House-Yellow House Cookout with guest Diane Cook, I made a blackberry-ginger pie, washed with a brilliant orange egg from the hens of Shoving Leopard farm. The fillings of all three were riffs on the recipe used here, with ginger or honey added. Eggwashed and baked, with a poem...
Blackberry Pie
by Jennifer Rae Vernon

is kernels of juice
blue, mom makes it do
magic heat to vanilla ice cream
purple dream

there were many nice things,
the corduroy pinafore
the daily notes in lunch sack
of a smiley face and curly cue hair
your mama loves you, and do great
with a thermos of homemade soup

dad too, he rocked me on front porch
after seven yellow jacket stings
i howled through the valley
in baking soda paste
while he sang, in the big rock candy mountain...

but just like grandma vernon always said
don't bother doing anything nice for your children
they'll only remember the bad things, anyway
like when she tethered my dad
to the front yard tree
so he could play when she was at work

was that bad? a ruined childhood?
bless her heart
and pie too, is sometimes
tart

I Made Two Pies... For Obama

The night before the election
With nerves running high
While my peeps worked the phone banks


I made these two pies:

The first is a pumpkin
Which was lacking in flavor
Not enough maple syrup
or spices to savor


The second looked sloppy
But tasted appley and sweet
An American classic
That like Obama, can't be beat.


We ate them together
On Tuesday night
We are all one people
One nation, that's right!

Blackberry: Picking. Eating. Pie

Blackberry-picking
by Seamus Heaney

Late August, given heavy rain and sun
For a full week, the blackberries would ripen.
At first, just one, a glossy purple clot
Among others, red, green, hard as a knot.
You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet
Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it
Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for
Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger
Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam-pots
Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots.
Round hayfields, cornfields and potato-drills
We trekked and picked until the cans were full,
Until the tinkling bottom had been covered
With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned
Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered
With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard's.

We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre.
But when the bath was filled we found a fur,
A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache.
The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush
The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour.
I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair
That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot.
Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not. 

On Sunday afternoon Julia and I ventured down to _____(undisclosed location) to pick blackberries. On the way, we were distracted by a small patch of beautiful pink thimble berries! We picked a few and then made our way to the blackberry patch, where there was an immense cache of berries--plump and DRIPPING off of the bushes! The picking was INTENSE--with recent heavy rains, the mosquitos are attacking in swarms and droves. We wore long pants and long sleeved shirts buttoned up to the top button (both for the thorns and the bugs), and slathered ourselves with bug balm, but it was not much use. To be able to stand it, we had to be entirely intent on the picking, not even allowing ourselves to be distracted by jokes or chit chat. We needed stamina, focus and determination. Julia compared it to the Olympics (Berry Picking: London 2012!). But we battled through the bugs, heat and impending thunderstorm, and walked away, scratched and bitten, but triumphant with 7 yogurt containers-full.

Blackberry Eating
by Galway Kinnell
I love to go out in late September
among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries
to eat blackberries for breakfast,
the stalks very prickly, a penalty
they earn for knowing the black art
of blackberry making; and as I stand among them
lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries
fall almost unbidden to my tongue,
as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words
like strengths or squinched or broughamed,
many-lettered, one syllabled lumps,
which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well
in the silent, startled, icy, black language
of blackberry eating in late September.

Once I got home, 2 of the containers were immediately washed and of course, prepared for pie.

I adapted the filling recipe from Rose Levy Beranbaum's Blackberry pie recipe in The Pie & Pastry Bible. 

Blackberry Pie
Ingredients
Nothing-in-the-House pie crust
7 c. FRESH blackberries
3/4 c. white sugar
3/4 c. brown sugar
2.5 Tblsp. arrowroot (thickener)
pinch of salt
2 tsp. lemon zest
pinch ginger
2 Tbslp. lemon juice

Directions
1. Prepare Nothing-in-the-House Pie crust as per the directions.

2. Mix sugar, arrowroot, salt, lemon zest, and ginger. Then add lemon juice and berries.

I had some leftover pie-crust dough (whole wheat) in the fridge, which I used for a nice, yet incomplete, lattice top. This was my first time using arrowroot as a thickener, and I like its effect. It doesn't leave behind any taste and is more 'natural' (less processed) than corn starch. Next time I might use a little more as the pie was rather runny:



SP came over with vanilla ice cream, along with Mandy, Graham, Julia, and Katy. We had some snacks (ginger tea, cucumber-olive salad by Mandy, tomato chutney and rhubarb-ginger jam by Julia) and then entered the Pie Enjoyment Zone.

SP, Julia & Graham in the PEZ

Katy in the PEZ & Mandy in the non-PEZ/COSPEZ.

After the pie, we headed to the Firehouse for the Greg Davis & Eric Chenaux show, which was really lovely-- if you were to think of what the appropriate music would be to depict the blackberry poems above, this might have been it.

A Poem by Emily Dickinson; Funeral Pie

1322

Go slow, my soul to feed thyself
Opon his rare approach -
Go rapid, lest competing death
Prevail opon the coach,
Go timid, should his testing eye
Determine thee amiss
Go boldly for thou paid'st the price,
Redemption for a kiss.

Frustrated with the high prices of the zombified out-of-season fruit populating the shelves of the local Tesco, I opted for this old Pennsylvania Dutch recipe. The filling is sweet, brown sugary, a little morose. Like a mince pie, but milder. Adding a slug of brandy to the filling wouldn't be out of the question. I'd like to try a version of this recipe that doesn't involve cornstarch...hm. Well, here's the recipe I followed, courtesy of allrecipes.com:

FUNERAL PIE
"This a pie seen quite often in Amish homes. Because it is easy, quick and made from non-seasonal ingredients, it was often taken to the family of those grieving over a passing..."


INGREDIENTS:
2 cups raisins
2 cups water
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
1 pinch salt
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
Nothing-in-the-House pie crust recipe (halved)


DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C). Line a pan with half the pastry and chill.
2. Place the raisins and 2/3 cup of the water in a saucepan and heat over medium heat for 5 minutes.
3. Combine the sugars, cornstarch, spices, and salt in a bowl and , mixing all the time, slowly add the remaining water. Add this mixture to the heating raisins. Cook and stir this until the mixture starts to bubble. Add the vinegar and butter and heat until the butter is melted. Cool until just warm.
4. Pour into the prepared shell and top with the second crust. Bake 25 minutes or until golden. Cool.


Related links:

A brief "history" of funeral pie
A page on Pennsylvania Dutch cookery