Becoming American: The A-peeling History of Apple Pie
7 pm online

Our bi-weekly live lecture series continues this week.

Just how American is apple pie? Discover the surprising origins of this dessert and learn how it came to be a national symbol. Explore historic recipes and follow along as we recreate an early version of this dish at home (see recipe below) during our live virtual lecture.

For this special event, Kerber’s Farm is offering 20% of any full-size apple pie (either traditional or crumb) on the day of the event!

Free, $5 donation suggested. Register at cshwhalingmuseum.org/events

This recipe is taken from American cookery, or, The art of dressing viands, fish, poultry, and vegetables : and the best modes of making pastes, puffs, pies, tarts, puddings, custards, and preserves : and all kinds of cakes, from the imperial plumb to plain cake, adapted to this country, and all grades of life.  Or American Cookery for short, written by Amelia SImmons and published in 1796. It is the first cookbook written by an American (rather than being a British import).  

Only a few amounts are specified - baking was done by taste (or dictated by the amount of ingredients available to you).  For those who'd like to cook along, expect to use about 3 or 4 apples for the filling and as much or as little of the other ingredients as desired.  For the crust (paste), Amelia gets more specific, basing her ratios on a peck of flour, so you should  need about 3 3/4 cups flour, 3 sticks of butter, and 1 egg.

A Buttered Apple Pie.

Pare, quarter and core tart apples, lay in paste No. 3, cover with the same; bake half an hour, when drawn, gently raise the top crust, add sugar, butter, cinnamon, mace, wine or rose-water q: s:

Puff Pastes for Tarts 

No. 3. To any quantity of flour, rub in three fourths of it's [sic] weight of butter, (twelve eggs to a peck) rub in one third or half, and roll in the rest.