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.

Apple-Raspberry Pandowdy

Portions of this upcoming post originally appeared in the piece "Cobbled Together: American Fruit Desserts" on NPR's Kitchen Window, which you can find here. 

"Shoofly pie and apple pandowdy makes your eyes light up, your tummy say howdy!" my dad used to sing to me, a nod to his Pennsylvania upbringing. But I'd never ate a pandowdy or let alone knew what it was, until I was researching it a few weeks ago for the Kitchen Window piece. My research yielded some information, though the origins of the strange name are still unclear (though I do have a query into the Library of Congress about it, so stay tuned...). Some consider "dowd-y" to be a variation of the word "dough," and others conjecture that it descended from the term "pandoulde," a regional British word for custard. 

What we do know is that the pandowdy has New England roots and can be made with either typical pie dough or a biscuit crust.  It's a very close relative to the cobbler, though it varies in two distinct ways: Molasses is used to sweeten the fruit, and just before it's finished baking, the crust is sliced or crumbled into pieces and mixed with the fruit juices to create dumpling-like morsels scattered among the thick filling. For those of you paralyzed by the task of making the perfect-looking crust, the pandowdy may just be your dessert. You'll spoon the filling over it anyway, so who cares what it looks like?

Traditionally, pandowdy was made with apples, but I threw in some raspberries to add tartness and take advantage of the fall-bearers. Try using late-summer or early-fall apples like Gravenstein, Northern Spy, or Benhams-- a variety popular in Kentucky and Virginia. The result is an earthy dessert with a rich, hearty flavor (you should be a molasses lover). It pairs well with a lightly-spiced ice cream, like cardamom, or just plain vanilla. I like to bake mine in a cast iron skillet, but if you don't have one, a pandowdy can be made just as well in a 8- or 9-inch square or round baking dish.

Apple-Raspberry Pandowdy

Ingredients
For the biscuit top:
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 Tblsp. granulated sugar + 1 tsp. for sprinkling
1 Tblsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 c. (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, cold and cut into 1/2-inch chunks
3/4 c. whole milk

For the filling:
5 apples (about 2 lbs.) cored and cut into 1/2-inch wedges
1 c. raspberries
2 Tblsp. all-purpose flour
1/3 c. molasses
1/3 c. granulated sugar
2 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. salt
2 Tblsp. unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch chunks

Directions
1. For the biscuit top, in a medium bowl whisk together flour, 1 Tblsp. sugar, baking powder, and salt. With a knife and fork or pastry cutter, cut in the butter until the mixture resembles cornmeal and peas. Add milk and stir gently to combine. Form dough into a ball and cover with plastic wrap. Store in the fridge for at least 20 minutes while you prepare the filling.

2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. In a medium bowl, combine apples, berries, flour, molasses, sugar, and lemon juice. Stir in cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla, and salt. Pour filling into a 9-inch cast iron skillet. Cover with foil and bake for 25 minutes.

3. While filling is baking, on a clean, floured surface, roll out the biscuit dough into a 9-10-inch circle. Set aside.

4. Once filling has baked, remove from oven and cover the filling with the biscuit dough, tucking any overhang into the sides of the skillet and sprinkling with the remaining teaspoon of sugar. Return to the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes more, until biscuit dough is light golden and filling is bubbling.

5. Remove from the oven and with a sharp knife, cut biscuit top into squares. Spoon some of the steaming filling over the biscuit and return to oven to bake 5-10 minutes more. Remove from oven and let cool. Serve slightly warm.

Related recipes:
Cranberry-Lime Galette
Peach-Blackberry Cobbler
Plum-Cherry Crumble

"A Commonplace Book of Pie" Reading & Tasting

This evening Seattle poet, pie baker, and Pie School founder Kate Lebo and I will be hosting a reading & pie tasting at Trohv DC. Kate will be reading from her new book A Commonplace Book of Pie, we'll talk feminism, domesticity, and pie, and then serve some! Kate and I have been discussing our ideas on these topics for a while now, we're so excited to share this conversation (and pie) with others. You can find more info via Trohv's facebook invite here. Hope to see you!

The Friday Pie Slice: Fall Equinox Edition

My most favorite time of year is almost here. I know that spring is traditionally the season of reawakening, but I tend to feel most invigorated in the fall. I'm back home, reconnecting with friends, digging into  some new projects, and getting back into the kitchen. Here's a few of the things I'm working on, and others' work I'm excited about.

1st slice. My copy of Hoosier Mama's Book of Pie arrived in the mail this week. Can't wait to try out ALL the recipes, starting with the Fat Elvis Pie, I reckon, which I'll be sharing soon. In the meantime, read about my visit to the Chicago pie shop and get the recipe for Hoosier Sugar Cream Pie here.

2nd slice. This coming Wedesday, Kate Lebo, Seattle pie baker, poet, and author of A Commonplace Book of Pie and I are doing a reading and pie event at Trohv DC. We'll chat about domesticity and feminism and pie, and of course, serve some too. Details here.

3rd slice. This weekend my grad school thesis advisor and all-around heroine Marcie Cohen Ferris & Southern Foodways Alliance's John T. Edge will be on The Splendid Table talking the role of women in Southern food. Tune in!

The tasty crumbs. For your listening pleasure, I made a Fall Equinox mix of some favorite American and British folk songs (-ish). Have a listen this weekend when you're putting up apple butter or driving to the orchard or sitting on your butt on the porch drinking a hard cider. Find it on my music blog, The Everchanging Minstrel.

Illustration by Jessica Lynn Bonin from Kate Lebo's A Commonplace Book of Pie, Chin Music 2013

Plum-Cherry Crumble

Portions of this upcoming post originally appeared in the piece "Cobbled Together: American Fruit Desserts" on NPR's Kitchen Window, which you can find here.

Next up in the cobbler family--the crisp (or crumble, as it's called in England), whichever you call it, it's the cobbler's thrifty cousin, sporting a simple crumbled top of sugar, flour, butter and sometimes oats or nuts. All of that is simply scattered over a fruit filling — a great choice for the crust-fearing baker. Of course, you can easily turn this into a pie or tart with the addition of a bottom crust. My mom's Crumble Top Apple Pie (made with Northern Spies, of course) is one of my favorites and this Whole Wheat Plum Crumble Tart has become a go-to recipe.

Though unless you've stockpiled some tart cherries in cans or freezer bags, you'll likely have a hard time getting your hands on tart cherries this time of year. But this crumble recipe would work well with any kind of stone fruit for a dark, rich and smooth filling, that's made sweet and crunchy by the buttery almond crumble top.

Plum-Cherry Crumble

Ingredients
For filling:
2 c. tart cherries, pitted
1 1/2 lbs. plums (about 4 c. or 9 plums), cut into 1/4-inch slices (or substitute your favorite stone fruit)
1 tsp. orange zest
1/3 c. brown sugar, packed
2 Tblsp. cornstarch

For crumble top:
3/4 c. sliced almonds
1 c. all-purpose flour
1/4 c. light brown sugar, packed
1/4 c. granulated sugar
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
3/4 tsp. salt
1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter at room temperature, cut into 1/2-inch chunks

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a medium bowl combine cherries, plums, orange zest, brown sugar, and cornstarch. Pour the filling into a 9x9-inch baking pan.

2. In a small bowl combine sliced almonds, flours, sugars, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Stir in the butter and use your hands to form small clumps with the dry ingredients. Scatter crumble top over the top of the filling.

3. Bake 40-50 minutes until the topping is golden brown and the filling is bubbling. Let cool and serve still warm.

Related recipes:
Peach-Blackberry Cobbler
Peach-Pecan Pie
Whole Wheat Plum Crumble Tart

The Friday Pie Slice

Inspired by Morgan, the genius at PandaHead, I'm serving up a new weekly series here on Nothing-in-the-House--The Friday Pie Slice! Each Friday, I'll post a round-up of pie and pie-relevant stories, links, and news from the past week. Expect historical articles and recipes, food events and interviews, music and art. If you've got something you think might be a good fit for The Slice, don't hesitate to get in touch. Got your plate? Let's eat!

1st slice. Check out Phoebe Lawless of Durham's Scratch Bakery (previously featured on the pie blog here and here) in the latest issue of Garden & Gun with recipes for 3 late summer pies and lovely illustrations to boot.

2nd slice. My pal April McGreger of Farmer's Daughter Brand Pickles and Preserves shares her preserve-making philosophy on A Chef's Life.

3rd slice. "Some made good pies, some made good applesauce. And some, made really good cider." Orchardist Lee Calhoun talks about his preservation of "old-timey apples" on WUNC.

The tasty crumbs. My friend and fellow folklorist Ashley Melzer and I just finished a short film for the Southern Foodways Alliance on DC's historic Maine Ave. Fish Market. If you watch closely, you'll notice that they do, in fact, sell pies there...

Illustration by Elizabeth Graeber from our book Pie: A Hand Drawn Almanac, available on Etsy

Peach-Blackberry Cobbler

In this next set of posts, I'll be introducing you (though you've likely already met) to some castoff members of the pie family. They're the distant cousins who show up late to every family function with their shirt untucked and hair a mess, but who once you get them going, make the party with their outrageous stories and ridiculous jokes. Yes, I'm talking about cobblers and crisps, buckles and pandowdies. Portions of these upcoming posts originally appeared in the piece "Cobbled Together: American Fruit Desserts" on NPR's Kitchen Window, which you can find here.

We'll start with the matriarch of this slapdash family--the cobbler. I didn't understand the dessert until I understood the word. A professional "cobbler" is often thought of as a shoemaker and repairman, but a true cobbler is only a mender of shoes. A cordwainer is the more masterful footwear maker.

A cordwainer would not want to be called a cobbler. And a delicately latticed pie would not want to be mistaken for the less artful dessert that's thrown or "cobbled" together with disparate bits of fruit and pastry. Though a cobbler may not be as pretty as a fresh pie or a new shoe, the result is just as functional, enjoyable and more economical, at least in terms of time and effort.

Cobblers appear in American cookbooks at least as far back as the mid-1800s, where they are described as a dessert or "luncheon" consisting of a biscuit or pastry dough and fresh fruit, often peaches. Though some boast a double crust, what characterizes the cobbler is the baked top crust that covers the sweet, bubbling fruit filling.

Cobblers are a wonderful way to experiment with combinations of summer fruits. I like to pair stone fruit and berries, as the tart berries provide the perfect counterbalance to the sweet tree fruit. This cobbler pairs peaches with blackberries, but you could easily substitute other seasonal fruits — nectarines, apricots or plums for the peaches and blueberries or raspberries for the blackberries. After all, you're cobbling it together. If the shoe fits, wear it.

Peach-Blackberry Cobbler

Ingredients

For the biscuit top:

1 ½ c. flour

1 Tblsp. granulated sugar, plus 1 Tblsp. for sprinkling

1 Tblsp. baking powder

½ tsp. salt

¼ c. (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, cold and cut in to ½-inch chunks

¾ c. whole milk

For the filling:

3 lbs. peaches (about 8 cups or 6-8 peaches) cut into 1/2-inch slices

1 c. blackberries (about 1 pint)

½ c. granulated sugar

2 Tblsp. light brown sugar, packed

3 Tblsp. cornstarch

1 tsp. salt

1 Tblsp. lemon juice

1 tsp. fresh ginger, grated

Directions

1. For the biscuit top, in a medium bowl, whisk together flour, 1 tablespoon sugar, baking powder and salt. With a knife and fork or pastry cutter, cut in the butter until mixture resembles the consistency of cornmeal and peas. Add milk and stir gently to combine. Form dough into a ball and cover with plastic wrap. Store in the refrigerator for at least 20 minutes while you prepare the filling. 

2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. In a medium bowl, combine the peaches, berries, sugars, cornstarch, salt, lemon juice and ginger. Pour filling into a deep-dish, 9-inch (2 quart) glass oven-safe bowl, or an 11-by-7-inch baking pan.

3. Remove biscuit dough from the refrigerator and unwrap. Divide dough into 10 to 12 balls of equal size (an ice cream scoop works well for this) and spoon evenly over the filling. Sprinkle biscuit top with remaining tablespoon of sugar.

4. Bake for 55-65 minutes until biscuit top is golden brown and filling is bubbling. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack. Serve warm with a scoop of ice cream.

Related recipes:

Quince Biscuit Pie

Surry County Peach Sonker with Dip

Peach Pie with a Sweet Basil Glaze

This morning, I went to church. It's something I rarely do, but today, Donna Schaper was up from the city and speaking at the one-room Presbyterian church here in Rensselaerville. From what Molly had told me about Donna's feminist ideals, involvement with Occupy, and the 29 books she's written, I wanted to hear her talk.

The sermon was about measurability and immeasurability and how they are not, in fact, opposites, but accomplices. She spoke of how both are useful;  that the measurable--how much we pay for something, how much salt we put in a recipe, or how much dosage of a medicine we are prescribed-- are necessary. But the immeasurable is what really matters-- what, when leading a moral or spiritual or religious life, is most important.

The sermon made me think of the pie baking lesson I gave this week. One of the LongHouse scholars, Sophia, had previously been through a pie making disaster the week before (though she is generally a wonder in the kitchen!) and asked me for help. So on Monday morning, we set up in Molly's blue kitchen, each with our own measuring cups, ingredients, and large mixing bowls. I gave Sophia the proportions of my pie crust recipe-- 2 cups flour, 1 1/2 sticks of butter, 1 tsp. salt... and we started measuring and mixing.

But I also showed her what a crust should look like-- how it should feel as it comes together in your hands, when it's too dry or too wet or overworked, and when it's just right. I showed her how to transfer the dough to the pan by curling it up around the rolling pin (a favorite trick) and how to adapt recipes for other fillings and pies to come. 

In this case, both measurable and immeasurable were important, but it is the unquantifiable that will help her to become a confident life-long baker who can tweak recipes and add her own creative touch. As I responded to her questions and considered the best way to explain what "cornmeal and peas" looks like, I also found myself learning how to be a better teacher, but not in a way you could measure with teaspoon or tablespoon, cup or ounce.

While I made a classic peach pie, Sophia added fresh blueberries to hers. We brushed a sweet basil glaze on both and enjoyed them with the rest of the scholars after a Southern-inspired dinner of ham, soup beans, greens, and slaw.

Peach Pie with a Sweet Basil Glaze
Adapted from The New York Times Heritage Cookbook

Ingredients
For the pie:
Nothing-in-the-House pie crust
6 c. fresh peaches, peeled and sliced
1 tsp. lemon juice
1/2 c. flour
2/3 c. brown sugar
1/4 tsp. fresh ginger, zested
1 tsp. salt
2 Tblsp. unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
Turbinado sugar, for dusting

For the glaze:
1 c. water
1 c. sugar
Handful fresh basil leaves

Directions
For the pie:
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. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a medium bowl, combine peaches, lemon juice, flour, brown sugar, ginger, and salt. Pour filling into the bottom crust. Dot the top of the filling with 2 Tblsp. butter

3. To make the lattice, lay 5-8 strips parallel across the pie and fold back every other strip. Weave the same number of strips perpendicular to the first strips, alternating over and under. Trim strips so that they leave a 1-inch overhang. Fold bottom crust over the lattice and tuck the excess under. Seal and flute edges decoratively. Brush lattice with the leftover egg and dust with Turbinado sugar.

4. Bake until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbling, approximately 40-45 minutes. Once done, remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack. Prepare sweet basil glaze, then brush on crust. Serve slightly warm with a scoop or two of vanilla ice cream.

For sweet basil glaze:
1. In a small saucepan, combine sugar, water, and basil. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium, and let simmer until syrup becomes thick and coats the back of a spoon. Let steep for 15-20 minutes, then brush on pie crust.

Related Recipes:

Peach-Pecan Pie

Peach-Bourbon-Ginger Hand Pies

Blueberry Hand Pies

For the past month, I've been working as the Director of the LongHouse Scholars Program, a food media internship in Rensselaerville, NY. My job is part curriculum developer, part camp counselor, part media editor, and part teacher. Mostly I've been setting up a lot of structure-- planning the weekly schedule, researching background for documentaries, and managing projects. In a way, I'm setting up the frame and canvas for the 9 scholars to paint within.

That role was also true, in a sense, for these blueberry hand pies. My coworker and LongHouse chef extraordinare Ame, asked me to make several batches of pie crust that we could freeze and use throughout the program. One night during dinner prep, two scholars, Thomas and Johnisha, used some of the dough to make dessert for the scholars and staff and our visiting guests-- Rod and Debra Smith of Smith Bites. Though I've sometimes missed being the one leading the creative direction, I've also learned that I love facilitating other's artistic work, whether you can eat it with ice cream or not.



Blueberry Hand Pies
Adapted from Bon Appetit

Ingredients
Nothing-in-the-House Pie Crust
4 c. (about 20 oz.) fresh blueberries
2 tsp. lemon zest
2 Tblsp. lemon juice
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 tsp. kosher salt
1 large egg, whisked with 1 tsp. heavy cream
2 Tblsp. Turbinado sugar, for sprinkling

Directions
1. Prepare Nothing-in-the-House pie crust as per the directions. Once chilled, roll out dough onto a floured surface and cut into 12 rectangles of equal size. Place rectangles on parchment paper on a cookie sheet and return to chill in the fridge while you prepare the filling.

2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. In a medium bowl, toss blueberries, lemon zest, lemon juice, sugar, and salt. Remove cut dough from fridge and mound blueberry mixture into the center of each rectangle. Brush edges of rectangles with water, fold dough over filling, and press edges with a fork to seal. Brush hand pies with egg wash, sprinkle with sugar, and cut a steam vent in the top of each.

3. On a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, bake hand pies for 35-45 minutes, rotating cookie sheet half-way through. Filling will be bubbling and crust will be golden brown when done. Transfer pies to a wire rack and let cool. Serve warm or at room temperature with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Related recipes:
Blueberry Icebox Pie
Peach Bourbon Ginger Hand Pies

Cracker Pie a.k.a. Mock Apple Pie

This piece originally appears in the The Runcible Spoon's SALT issue (vol. 3, issue 11). Pick up a copy of the saline DC food zine here.

When you see crackers in a pie recipe, you’re probably thinking crust—crushed graham crackers for Key Lime or Banana Cream, or maybe a saltine crust for the salty-tart Atlantic Beach Pie. But crackers in the filling? It doesn’t sound too appealing.

Turns out, though, that Cracker Pie, a.k.a. Mock Apple Pie, is a classic American recipe, dating back to at least the mid-1800s. It’s mentioned in an 1858 letter from Henderson, Texas resident Sue Smith to her friend Bet. She writes,

Bet I have learned to make a new kind of Pie I think you all would like them they taste just like an apple pie make some and try them see if you don’t love them… Take a teaspoon heaping full of tartarlic acid and dissolve it in water a teasp full of sugar and stir it in the acid then take cold biscuit or light bread and crumble in it.

A version also appears in the 1863 Confederate Receipt Book, and in Mrs. B.C. Whiting’s 1894, How We Cook In Los Angeles, listed as “California Pioneer Apple Pie, 1852.” Of the apple imitation-by-crackers, Whiting writes, "The deception was most complete and readily accepted. Apples at this early date were a dollar a pound, and we young people all craved a piece of Mother's apple pie to appease our homesick feelings." An 1870 version notes the pie as being “a good recipe for Spring use,” likely because apples were out of season then, and put-up or storage apple stocks had been emptied.

Whatever the reason for its invention, its creator was clearly an early molecular gastronomist, as the cream of tartar’s acidity allows the crackers to maintain their shape and breaks down their sugar into a form closer to that of apples. The lemon and cinnamon, two ingredients common to most apple pie recipes, fool your tongue-brain connection to think “apple!” instead of “cracker!”

Here’s a version of the recipe, which has been printed on the back of the Ritz cracker box since the 1930s. Now go see if you can trick your friends.



Cracker Pie a.k.a. Mock Apple Pie
Based on versions from Saveur and the back of the Ritz Cracker box c. 1935

Ingredients
Nothing-in-the-House pie crust
1 ¾ c. sugar
2 tsp. cream of tartar
2 Tblsp. lemon juice
Zest of 1 lemon
½ tsp. cinnamon
2 c. coarsely broken Ritz, Saltine, or soda crackers
2 Tblsp. unsalted butter, cubed
1 egg, beaten
Turbinado 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 medium saucepan combine sugar, cream of tartar, and 1 ¾ c. water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low, simmering for 15 minutes. Remove from heat and add lemon juice, zest, and cinnamon. Let syrup cool to room temperature while you fit bottom pie crust into a 9’’ pie tin.

3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Fill bottom shell with broken crackers and roll out top crust if you haven't yet already. Pour syrup over the crackers and dot mixture with butter cubes. Place top crust over the filling and flute edges to seal. Cut steam vents into the top of the pie, brush with the egg and sprinkle with Turbinado sugar.

4. Bake pie until the crust is golden brown, about 35 minutes. Let pie cool completely and serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or sharp cheddar.

Related recipes:
Apple Pie with Salted Caramel Glaze
Green Tomato Pie

Eating Our Words: A Progressive Dinner

As I previously mentioned, this spring at NELP I taught a Food Writing Society to a wonderful group of five talented women. The final project of the society was to create a culminating event that would allow us to share our work with the rest of the community. We wanted to convey the principles of our class-- that food is a language and that exploring the foods of our required authors (Thoreau and his beans and bread, Sarah Orne Jewett and the pies in The Country of the Pointed Firs, Wallace Steven's "Study of Two Pears," etc.), informs our reading of the text as well as our "reading" of the food. We also wanted to communicate our belief that food is an important foundation for intellectual thought and writing, and can be a symbol for relationships, identity, history, and culture. At NELP and in many of the communities that we inhabit, food is the nexus of social life.

With these goals in mind, we collaboratively developed a progressive dinner, "Eating Our Words," that would allow us to recreate and share the foods of our authors in different settings around Camp Kabeyun. We started with chowders, beans, and bread in the dining hall, and via a map, lead everyone on a self-guided eating tour. 

There were stops at the herb garden for a sampling Alymer's elixirs, from the Nathaniel Hawthorne story "The Birthmark," a recreation of Phoebe's kitchen from Carolyn Chute's novel Merry Men, a half-bushel of cornmeal-- weekly rations for four slaves, which Frederick Douglass writes of in his Narrative, and pickles on the dock as per the Lloyd S. Barrington poem, also from Merry Men. It all culminated in the Bowden/NELP family reunion, inspired by Country of the Pointed Firs, with pies and Emily Dickinson's coconut cake, and a reading of the student's work.

Though we had to change some plans due to windy and rainy weather--we had wanted to have our "doughnut island" on the floating dock (mostly to see who would swim for a doughnut) and our Family Reunion in the meadow-- the dinner was wonderful and left me inspired and full. I think we met our goals of prompting others to consider the importance of food in literature and our own lives.


I was so impressed and thankful by the work of the society members-- Abby, Ariella, Brooke, Emily, and Madalyn. They put in a lot of time and hard work in the kitchen and the typewriter to pull it all off. In the words of Sarah Orne Jewett, "The feast was a noble feast," with "an elegant ingenuity displayed in the form of pies, which delighted my heart."

 

Cheap Tart Bakery's Dinah Grossman on Rhubarb

When I embarked on my Chicago Pie Tour back in March, one pie slinger I sadly missed is the suggestively named Cheap Tart Bakery. Owned and operated by pastry chef Dinah Grossman, Cheap Tart offers up sweet and savory pies, galettes and tarts, hand pies and pie pops, all made-to-order with seasonal, local ingredients and available for delivery within Chicago's city limits. For all you Windy City dwellers, that means you could have fresh Ginger Cream Pie, Apple Tarte Tatin, or Maple Pecan Pie Pops (and much more) appear on your doorstep in 48 hours.

Though I didn't get to make an order when I was there, Dinah has written up a lovely little post about her love of rhubarb which developed while she was growing up in rural Maine. Then, she shares her recipe for a beautiful Rhubarb Tart.

"Before starting my pie business, I didn’t give much thought to why pie was the thing I always chose to bake. I liked to eat it, of course, and I enjoyed the tactile elements--rolling out the crust, with its pale flecks of butter showing through, slicing ripe peaches, squeezing the pits from juicy tart cherries. But perhaps more that those things I found it comforting to have a pie nearby. It wasn’t so much that pie reminded me of someone in particular (I do not come from a long line of pie makers), but through its ingredients, a pie connected me to a sense of place. I just felt better with on around.

            

I grew up in rural Maine, surrounded by acres of woods, fields, and orchards. In our family we mapped much of that land by referring to perennial edible landmarks--the blackberry patch, a particular apple tree, or the place where the rhubarb reappeared every spring. I would keep a watchful eye on these particular locations, making sure I knew when the blackberries or apples were almost ready so I never missed them at their peak. Often, impatient for the fruit to ripen, I would sample a berry or apple too soon, the intensely sour bite of the juice becoming, over the years, as welcome a taste as the mellow sweetness that followed a couple of weeks later. To this day I prefer fruits with a pronounced acidity, which explains my affinity for that tartest of pie ingredients: rhubarb.

Of all the edibles whose progress I monitored, rhubarb could be counted on to appear first and was ready to be harvested long before anything else. It was also plentiful, the long stalks and elephantine leaves growing at a pace even our steady pie baking couldn’t match. During rhubarb season a pie was almost always on the kitchen table. And not just at our house. For many of our neighbors, too, a rhubarb pie became as ubiquitous as the salt and pepper shakers on the counter. When only a slice remained in the Pyrex plate, someone inevitably walked outside and pulled another armful of stalks from the ground to be baked into a replacement.

Aside from pie, I enjoyed rhubarb best pulled straight from the ground, the end dipped in a small bowl of dark brown sugar. As kids, my ordinarily health-conscious mother would let us take our treat outside, where a stalk of rhubarb dipped then chewed and sucked on, became an activity as well as a snack. My favorite spot to sit and chew was inside a horseshoe of lilac bushes growing around an enormous rock in our yard. Surrounded by the heady smell of those pale purple flowers, the sweet and sour rhubarb would take on another taste altogether.

Like all favorite foods my love for rhubarb is inextricably connected to these memories. It is impossible to make a rhubarb pie without also remembering the cold, day-old slices eaten in my neighbor’s kitchen, how somehow the sweet-tart filling and crisp edges of crust tasted better a day after the pie was made. I can’t rinse a haul of farmers market rhubarb without also remembering the feeling of walking barefoot through the tall, wet lawn by our barn to pull up the shiny stalks, the squeak and snap as each came away from the plant. It’s been more than ten years since I lived near that patch, but as I bake my way through a third year of business I’m reminded of why I chose this pastry among all others to guide me. In a third floor Chicago apartment with no balcony or back yard maybe I can’t grow my own fruit, but I can mark the seasons by making pies from rhubarb, then strawberries, then peaches. If I can’t ground myself through the ground, I’ll do it with pie."

Post and photos by Dinah Grossman of Chicago's Cheap Tart Bakery. Find Cheap Tart online and on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Rhubarb Tart
From Dinah Grossman of Cheap Tart Bakery

Ingredients
For crust:
8 Tblsp. unsalted butter, cold, cut in the 1/2'' cubes
1 1/3 c. + 4 tsp. pastry flour
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1 Tblsp. granulated sugar
1 Tblsp. apple cider vinegar
1 c. ice water

For the filling:
4 c. rhubarb, cut into 1/2'' chunks
2/3 c. + 1 Tblsp. granulated sugar
Pinch kosher salt
4 Tblsp. tapioca powder
1/4 orange zest
2 Tblsp. fresh squeezed orange juice (about half an orange)
1 Tblsp. all-purpose flour
1 Tblsp. whole milk or cream for brushing

Directions
For crust:
1. In a bowl of a food processor combine the flour, salt, sugar, and butter. Pulse until the butter is broken down to the size of small peas.

2. Add the cider vinegar to the ice water and stir. Add 3 Tblsp. of the water/cider mixture to the food processor and pulse to moisten the flour mixture. If the mixture still looks dry and powdery, add more water a teaspoon at a time. The dough should just hold together when you squeeze a small amount in your hand, but it should not be sticky and should not form a ball in the food processor. When the mixture looks crumbly and slightly darker in color, it's done.

3. Dump the crumbs into a big mixing bowl and pack them into a rough ball. Wrap the ball in plastic wrap and use the plastic to help you flatten the dough into a disk. Refrigerate at least 1 hour, preferably overnight.

For filling and assembly:
1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl except 1 Tblsp. of the sugar an flour. When the rhubarb pieces are coated in the tapioca/sugar mixture, set aside.

2. Toll the pie crust into a circle about 1/8'' thick. The crust should hang over the edges of the pie pan by about an inch and a half all the way around. Place the crust in the pie pan, and sprinkle the Tblsp. of flour and 2 tsp. of sugar on the bottom.

3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Add the rhubarb mixture to the crust, mounding the filling slightly in the center. Starting with the edge of the crust farthest from you, fold the edge over the filling, then rotate the pan slightly and fold the crust over again, repeating all the way around. The crust will overlap at each fold. Brush the crust with the milk or cream, and sprinkle the remaining teaspoon of sugar over the top.

4. Bake at 400 for 25 minutes with the oven rack on the bottom rung. Reduce oven temperature to 375 and bake an additional 20-25 minutes (moving the tart to the middle rack of the oven), or until the crust is a deep golden brown and the juices are bubbling. Cool completely before slicing.

Related recipes:
Four and Twenty Blackbirds' Rhubarb Pie
Rhubarb Meringue Tart with a Pecan Shortbread Crust
Simple Rhubarb Tart

Orange Creamsicle Pie

Orange and cream--one of the best summer flavor combinations out there. When I was little, I used to enjoy it by way of a Dairy Queen Orange Mr. Misty Float-- an "orange" slushy with a scoop of vanilla soft serve; and of course, in the form of a Creamsicle. Not to be confused with the Dreamsicle, with its ice milk center, the more rich Creamsicle boasts a vanilla ice cream middle, coated with orange-flavored ice. 

Though the Creamsicle is an emblematic hot weather treat and National Creamsicle Day is apparently celebrated on August 14th, I made this pie version back in April, before I went away to the woods. There at the start of spring, I was still working through the box of Florida citrus I'd bought from a local school fundraiser, and needed to make a pie for my CSA members. I found this take on the Creamsicle, from Joy the Baker and adapted it only slightly. It's essentially an orange 'n' cream icebox pie and is just as refreshing at its popsicle counterpart. I think one member even put it in the freezer for a bit--the only thing missing was the popsicle stick.

Orange Creamsicle Pie

Adapted from Joy the Baker

Ingredients

For crust:

1 1/2 c. graham cracker crumbs

5 Tblsp. unsalted butter

1 Tblsp. sugar

1/4 tsp. salt

For filling:

3 1/2 Tblsp. cornstarch

1 c. sugar

1 Tblsp. orange zest

1/2 c. fresh squeezed orange juice

3 large egg yolks

1 c. milk

1 c. sour cream

1/4 c. unsalted butter, cut into chunks

1 c. heavy whipping cream (for whipped cream top)

Confectioner's sugar, to taste

Directions

For crust:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Pour graham cracker crumbs in a bowl and add melted butter, sugar, and salt until well mixed. 

2. Pat the buttery crumbs into a 9-inch pie pan, pressing mixture into the bottom and sides to form a pie crust. Place in oven and bake until crust is lightly browned, about 10-12 minutes. Place on a cooling rack and let cool to room temperature before adding the filling.

For filling:

1. Combine cornstarch, sugar, orange juice, zest, egg yolks, and milk in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook until thick, stirring constantly.

2. Add the chunks of butter and stir until they are completely melted. Let cool for 15 minutes, then add the sour cream, stirring to incorporate. Pour filling into the cooled graham cracker crust and place plastic wrap directly onto the surface of the pie. Place in the fridge and chill for at least 3 hours. 

3. Just before serving, whip the whipped cream in a small metal bowl with a few tablespoons of confectioner's sugar, if desired. Spoon on top of the pie, and serve still chilled.

Related recipes:

"Levon Helm's" Lemon Icebox Pie

Florida Grapefruit-White Chocolate Pie

Orange and Yogurt Tart

Shaker Orange Tarts