#2: Excuse me?
Can America save its national dish? Are you kidding me?
Today I receive multiple emails, messages, and texts with a link to a WA PO opinion piece. At least one of these pieces comes up each year on or just before the Fourth of July. This year’s offering is entitled Can America save its national dish?—with the subtitle, Americans invented the dessert we call pie. Why are we letting it die?
Do I have thoughts on this? Well, indeed I do.
1. Although Americans have glorified the sweet pie, and placed and exalted Apple, cherry, pumpkin, berry, and lemon meringue pies on the highest altar of Americana, we did not invent it.
2. Neither pie nor pie making is dying. For the last two decades if not longer, pie is the cover shot, center fold, and last word in magazines and books in the US and abroad, and continues to be so.
3. I read “no one makes a good pie on the first try…American pie is going to die from neglect.” Oh, no no no! That’s just not so. Pie continues to be practiced, taught, shared, and enjoyed. There are pie cookbooks galore out there. In Fall 2020 alone, six very good ones join their ranks, all of which are on my shelves. Pick any pie book and you’ll learn to make a good crust. Practice more and you’ll make a great crust.
When I get up tomorrow I will don my apron, set out basic ingredients, turn on Zoom and show a new crop of pie makers just how easy it is to make dough by hand, fill it with pie-worthy fruit, top it with a lattice crust, and bake. I cannot feel their doughs or they mine through the screen, but there will be plenty of words describing what all five senses—touch, sight, hearing, smell, taste—will be experiencing.
Are we letting pie die? Oh indeed we aren’t. In my world it’s very much alive.
Washington Post: “Can America Save It’s National Dish”, Megan McArdle, Jul 1, 2021
New York Times: “To Become a Better Cook, Sharpen Your Senses”, Julia Moskin, Mar 28, 2017
NPR: “As Chinese, Iranian, and Indonesian As Apple Pie”, Simran Sethi, Jul 3, 2016
I've stopped screaming and will now point out a couple of things:
What about chicken pot pies and beef pot pies? They're meat pies in good standing and, at least in my house, constantly being baked/eaten. Mincemeat pies are all over the place, especially during the holidays. Last week I came upon bbq pork pies made with a biscuit crust for sale and they were being snapped up....
And now this, my loudest scream: The pressure to achieve the perfect crust that your mother/grandmother/great-grandmother made removes all the joy of baking a pie. Yeah, it'd be nice to have a flaky buttery crust every time but often how it comes out is out of your control and says nothing about your worth in the world. It could be too humid out, or your flour not processed right. Maybe one of the kids needed you so much your butter/lard melted while rolling the dough out. Anything at all can influence the outcome. But there are many old remedies your forbearers didn't think twice turning to. Crust too hard? Break it into the filling, maybe add a dollop of warm or whipped cream. A little too mushy? Carefully remove it and mix up a crumb crust. Burnt meringue? Scoop it off and make another--it takes exactly 5 minutes and in the meantime you can pour your guests another glass of wine. They won't suspect a thing.
I'm not saying there isn't a slew of bad pies around, especially commercials one. And I'm woman enough to admit I've resorted to a Pillsbury crust when hard pressed to use leftover chicken or too ripened fruit.
The thing to remember is pie making is not a test of your character or patriotism or self-worth. Every pie made from the heart is good. No matter how it comes out.
So forget perfect. Just have fun. That's what pies are for.
I was thinking the same things as I read that article. I used to dislike pie, as a dessert. I'd been eating pie since I was a kid, and my mother was a haphazard cook and baker. She did it, she didn't like doing it and the results were often not very tasty. When I moved out on my own, I learned to cook from books. As I've grown older, I continue to learn. About 5 years ago, my husband asked for an apple pie, and I just didn't want to do it. I'd never made a pie crust in my life, and always bought the kind in the freezer. I added really good fillings, but the pastry tasted like cardboard. So, I'd seen an article in the Seattle Times about how to make the perfect apple pie, and I followed the directions to the letter.
That pie was a revelation! I didn't dislike pie - I'd just never tasted a good one before. That crust was flaky, tender, and - well - perfect! So, my first pie was excellent! My second attempt was less so, and I learned that pie crust is fickle. Some days it likes you and some days it doesn't. Then, a chance "meeting" online with you, Kate, at the Futurelearn class on Celebration Food for England's monarchs, (not really the title, but you get the gist) and I got really interested in pie.
I continue to practice and most of my pies are great. Some are good, and once in awhile, there's a stinker.