A Love Affair with Southern Cooking (58 page)

On our parents’ and grandparents’ farms we saw hogs grow fat and meaty, and we understood why a child eating a huge meal or taking the largest piece of pie was called a pig.

—
JEANNE VOLTZ AND ELAINE J. HARVELL
,
THE COUNTRY HAM BOOK

KEY LIME PIE

MAKES
6
TO
8
SERVINGS

I’ve eaten Key lime pie all over Florida—in the Keys, whence it comes; in Miami; and up and down the east and west coasts. Some pies have crumb crusts (a post–World War Two innovation, I’m told), others the more classic pastry shells. Some are swirled about with meringue, others with whipped cream. Some are chiffon pies with the meringue folded into the filling, some are even frozen. My own preference is for what my friend Jeanne Voltz calls a “legal” variation: whipped cream spread over a pale ivory filling (not a drop of green food coloring) cradled in a traditional pastry crust. Still, I welcome the innovations dreamed up by another friend, Kim Sunée, food editor of
Cottage Living
magazine. Instead of slathering meringue or whipped cream over her filling, she skim-coats it with a cup of crème fraîche tempered with two tablespoons of confectioners’ sugar. I find that inspired. As for the crust, Kim favors a graham cracker one but sometimes substitutes finely chopped dry-roasted macadamias for maybe a fifth of the crumbs.

Thought to have originated in Key West in the mid 1850s shortly after Gale Borden introduced sweetened condensed milk, Key lime pie owes its flavor, even its texture, to the tiny, tart yellow Key limes that once proliferated throughout the Keys. They are believed to have been introduced to Indian Key in the mid 1830s by Dr. Henry Perrine, then U.S. consul in Yucatán, who, it’s said, had Mexican limes, as they’re also known, shipped and planted there. Their excep
tional acidity “cooks” (thickens) the egg yolks in the filling, something the more familiar green Persian limes are too mellow to do. But as I would soon learn, genuine Key lime juice sometimes fails, too. I squeezed a dozen Key limes for the half cup of juice this recipe requires, stirred it in carefully, then continued stirring for several minutes, but my filling never really set up. So I baked the pie briefly and that solved the problem. I’m aware that that’s not traditional—sacrilegious, some say. But you cannot cut a filling the consistency of mustard. Note:
If you are unable to find fresh Key limes, use bottled Key lime juice. Most specialty food shops sell it and you can also order it online (see Sources, backmatter).

4 large pasteurized egg yolks (see About Pasteurized Eggs, frontmatter)

Pinch of salt

One 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk

½ cup fresh Key lime juice (12 to 14 Key limes; see Note above)

1 baked 9-inch pie shell (see About Pie Crusts, frontmatter)

1¼ cups heavy cream, whipped to soft peaks with 3 tablespoons confectioners’ (10 X) sugar

• 1.
  Preheat the oven to 350° F. Whisk the egg yolks and salt until smooth, then whisk in the sweetened condensed milk. Add the lime juice slowly, whisking gently all the while, then continue whisking for about 2 minutes or until slightly thickened.
  
• 2.
  Pour the filling into the baked pie shell, spreading to the edge; slide onto the middle oven shelf and bake for 15 minutes or until softly set.
  
• 3.
  Remove the pie from the oven, set on a wire rack, and cool to room temperature.
  
• 4.
  Swirl the whipped cream over the filling, making sure that it touches the crust all around. Refrigerate the pie for several hours before serving.
  
• 5.
  To serve, cut the pie into slim wedges. Refrigerate any leftover pie.
  

Variation

Classic Key Lime Pie with Meringue:
Prepare the recipe through Step 2. While the pie bakes, beat 3 large pasteurized egg whites to soft peaks with
¹
/
₃
cup sugar or unsifted confectioners’ (10X) sugar (my preference because it makes for a more stable meringue). Swirl the meringue over the hot filling, making sure that it touches the crust all around. Return to the middle oven shelf and bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until the meringue is tipped with brown. Cool the pie before cutting. Any leftover pie should be stored in the refrigerator.

Destination: Lime Pie!…Down in the Keys, where the wild limes grow, everyone uses the little yellow-green fruit with a tang that no other lime can boast.

—
CLEMENTINE PADDLEFORD
,
HOW AMERICA EATS

BROWN SUGAR PIE

MAKES
8
SERVINGS

I fell in love with this pie at the age of five in, of all places, the basement cafeteria of the Fred A. Olds Elementary School in Raleigh. It was my introduction to southern cooking and the beginning of my lifelong fascination with it. I have, however, added a personal fillip: After melting the butter, I let it brown slightly.

1 pound light brown sugar

4 large eggs

¼ cup milk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup (1 stick) butter, melted (see headnote)

One 9-inch unbaked pie shell (see About Pie Crusts, frontmatter)

• 1.
  Preheat the oven to 325° F.
  
• 2.
  Blend the brown sugar, eggs, milk, vanilla, and salt until smooth, then add the butter in a slow stream, beating all the while.
  
• 3.
  Pour the filling into the pie shell, slide the pie onto a baking sheet, and bake on the middle oven shelf for 50 to 60 minutes or until puffed and golden brown.
  
• 4.
  Transfer the pie to a wire rack and cool to room temperature before cutting. The filling will fall slightly—all chess pies do as they cool. Serve as is or top with whipped cream.
  

150-YEAR-OLD MOLASSES PIE

MAKES
6
TO
8
SERVINGS

Sorghum molasses (or “sweet sorghum,” as it’s also known) is most likely what cooks in rural Kentucky, the Blue Ridge, and the Smokies would have used in this pie a hundred years ago or more because nearly every family grew a patch of this grain to feed their livestock—plus a little extra for themselves. Early on, farmers learned how to press the juice from sorghum’s ripe seed clusters and boil it down into a sweet, thick syrup the color of amber: “nothin’ better on hot biscuits or pancakes.” If you’re traveling about Appalachia, you’re bound to see mason jars of sorghum molasses for sale at roadside stands and in country stores. I urge you to buy a quart. Sorghum molasses is lighter, mellower, and sweeter than cane molasses and its flavor is unique. You can also order sorghum molasses online (see Sources, backmatter) and, failing that, you can substitute a light, unsulfured cane molasses in this recipe and in any others that call for “sweet sorghum.”

¹
/
₃
cup sugar

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg or ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg

¼ teaspoon salt

3 large eggs

¾ cup molasses (see headnote)

½ cup milk or evaporated milk (I prefer evaporated milk)

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1½ teaspoons vanilla extract

One 9-inch unbaked pie shell (see About Pie Crusts, frontmatter)

• 1.
  Preheat the oven to 325° F. Whisk together the sugar, flour, nutmeg, and salt in a medium-size bowl. Whisk the eggs in, one by one, then mix in the molasses, milk, melted butter, and vanilla.
  
• 2.
  Pour the filling into the pie shell, slide the pie onto a baking sheet, and bake on the middle oven shelf for about 1 hour or until puffed and a cake tester inserted halfway between the edge and the center comes out clean.
  
• 3.
  If you want to serve the pie warm, cool on a wire rack for 30 minutes. Or, if you prefer, cool the pie to room temperature before serving.
  Note:
  The filling will fall somewhat but this is as it should be.
  Cut the pieces small and serve as is or topped by a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a generous ladling of whipped cream.
  

LEMON CHESS PIE

MAKES
8
SERVINGS

Next to brown sugar pie, this is my favorite chess pie. There are several theories as to how these pies came by their name. Some say that “chess” is a corruption of “chest,” meaning that these pies were so rich they could be stored in chests at room temperature. Others offer a different explanation: It seems that long ago when a good plantation cook was asked what she was making, she replied, “Jes pie,” which over time became “chess.” Still others insist that “chess” derives from “cheese,” as in the English lemon “cheese” (or curd). According to food historian Karen Hess, “cheese” was spelled “chese” in seventeenth-century England. In her historical notes and commentaries for the 1984 facsimile edition of Mary Randolph’s
Virginia House-wife
(1824), Hess writes: “Since the archaic spellings of cheese often had but one ’e’ we have the answer to the riddle of the name of that southern favorite ‘Chess Pie.’”

When I lived in New York, I baked dozens of lemon chess pies for the annual Gramercy Park fund-raiser and they sold as fast as I could unpack them. From that experience, I learned to buzz up the filling in the food processor. I even grate the lemon zest by processor. Here’s how: Strip the zest from the lemons with a swivel-bladed vegetable peeler, then churn it with the sugar to just the right texture. I next pulse in the lemon juice, then the eggs one by one. Finally, I drizzle the melted butter down the feed tube with the motor running. That’s all there is to it.

1½ cups sugar

Finely grated zest of 3 large lemons

Juice of 3 large lemons

5 large eggs

¹
/
₃
cup butter, melted

One 9-inch unbaked pie shell (see About Pie Crusts, frontmatter)

• 1.
  Preheat the oven to 325° F.
  
• 2.
  Combine the sugar, lemon zest, and lemon juice in a medium-size bowl. Beat the eggs in,
  one by one, then add the butter in a slow stream, beating all the while.
  
• 3.
  Pour the filling into the pie shell, slide the pie onto a baking sheet, and bake on the middle oven shelf for about 45 minutes or until puffed and delicately browned.
  
• 4.
  Transfer the pie to a wire rack and cool to room temperature before cutting; don’t fret when the filling begins to fall. This is what gives chess pies their silken texture. Cut into slim wedges and serve.
  

KENTUCKY CHESS PIE

MAKES
8
SERVINGS

It’s said that to sample Kentucky’s best chess pie, you must head for The Old Talbott Tavern in Bardstown. I did exactly that some years ago. And although I’d only eaten two or three other versions of the famous Kentucky Chess Pie, the tavern’s won hands down. What follows is my stab at the tavern’s secret recipe, and I think it comes pretty close. In business since 1779, the Talbott Tavern has hosted such VIPs as Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Boone, Stephen Collins Foster, John James Audubon, even the exiled King Louis Philippe of France, who settled in with his entire entourage. The second-floor murals were painted by the young royal, then later shot up by Jesse James. Those murals suffered far greater damage early in 1998 when fire ravaged the inn. Shuttered for nearly two years, the Talbott Tavern is once again open and serving the recipes that made it famous. Bardstown, if you don’t know it, is where you’ll find “My Old Kentucky Home” of Stephen Foster fame as well as some of Kentucky’s best bourbon (it calls itself “The Bourbon Capital of the World”).