Union Club, Park Street, Boston MA. Photograph by James Wallace Black, 17 June 1875; Boston Public Library, Print Department; Flickr
NEW ENGLAND PIE
Pie is the masterpiece of New England home cookery. In Maine they still make those deep apple pies–clove flavored, generous, ample pies that one can make a flavorous meal of. But pie reaches its apotheosis at the Union club in this city. There an exquisite compound of pastry and the noblest of fruits is brought to tempt the sated appetites of the golden bucks and epicurean judges. The Union club apple pie is the pie idealized, the justifications of Mme. Eve’s plucking of the immortal fruit. If she tempted Adam with this prince of pies, no wonder he was willing to give up Eden for life on an Asiatic ranche. All Boston eateth of the pie. The broker and banker climb the cafe stool and bolt their pie and coffee. The shop girl carries in her lunch box from her frowsy boarding house a triangle of pie. The newsboy hath his pie in his mind as he trudges through the storm. Our supreme court judges eat pie with a gusto. I sat beside a supreme judge a few weeks ago at the Massasoit House in Springfield. If my memory does not fail, the learned lawyer and ex-attorney general of the United States ate both mince and peach pie. The Indian in our Massachusetts coat of arms holds a pie knife in his hands and our State motto, properly translated reads: “We will have a piece of pie if we have to fight for it.” [Chicago Tribune, as published in New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene NH), March 11, 1885, Vol LXXXVII Issue 10 Page 4
John Greenleaf Whittier, 25 November 1885, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington DC
A VALUABLE KNIFE
An acquaintance of ours once breakfasted in the tavern at Amesbury, Mass. His attention was attracted to and riveted on a venerable gentleman at the table opposite, who voraciously shoveled big pieces of cold apple pie into his mouth by means of a knife. The spectacle amused if it did not horrify the spectator he could hardly understand how one of so noble a countenance and so distinguished a presence should consume cold apple pie for breakfast, and, more shockingly yet, scoop in the monstrous comestible with a vulgar, plebeian knife.
“Tell me,” said our friend to the waiter, after the venerable stranger had left the room, “who was that old gentleman who shoveled in that atrocious cold pie so industriously?”
“That, sir,” answered the waiter proudly, as he drew himself up to his full height, “that sir, was Mr. Whittier, our famous poet.”
“Oh, if thats the case,” cried our friend, “it’s all right, cold pie or no cold pie. I’m free to say that whatever Mr. Whittier does needs no apology or justification.”
Our friend meant it too. As an earnest of his sincerity he captured the very knife with which the famous poet had eatn the cold apple pie, and that knife is now one of the most treasured possessions of the gentleman who gave us this interesting narrative [Eugene Field in Chicago News – published Wednesday June 10, 1891, New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene NH) XCIII, Issue 23, Page 2
Drawing. The Parrot and Apple Tree, by Sally Hodgdon (1780-1855), 1810. Ink and watercolor on paper. Sally Hodgdon was the daughter of Abner & Sarah (Dame) Hodgdon, a NH Watercolorist, and School teacher in Milton (1804, 1806) and Farmington (1811) New Hampshire. From the New Hampshire Historical Society Collection.
THE LOWELL APPLE PIE
It has been the complaint of many housekeepers that their pies failed to bake well on the bottom, the result being a half-baked, soggy under-crust, which was wholly unfit to be eaten. Some afflicted housekeeper has invented a remedy for this, and it having come to the knowledge of some of our good Lowell cooks, and tried by them, it finds its way into “The Tea Table.” We have eaten a pie made in this way and call it delicious. Fill a deep plate with thiny slice apple, sprinkle sugar over it, and add a few bits of butter and a little nutmet (some use cinnamon instead), and then put a rim of rich crust around it to keep in the juice. Cover it with crust and bake it. When done turn it upside down on another place, and you will then have your undercrust thoroughly baked. Take the white of an egg, beaten to a froth add two tablespoons of sugar, frost the top of the pie, and brown. If you want more frosting use more eggs. [Lowell Currier] –found in New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene NH) Wednesday, November 16, 1887, Vol LXXXIX, Issue 46, Page 1
DRIED APPLE PIES
I loathe, abhor, detest, despise,
Abominate dried apple pies.
I like good bread I like good meat,
Or anything that’s fit to eat;
But of all poor grub beneath the skies
The poorest is dried apple pies.
Give me the toothache or sore eyes,
But don’t give me dried apple pies.
The farmer takes his gnarliest fruit,
‘Tis wormy, bitter, and hard to boot;
They leave the hulls to make us cough,
And don’t take half the peeling off.
Then on a dirty cord ’tis strung,
And in a garret window hung;
And there is serves a roost for flies
Until it’s made up into pies.
Tread on my corns and tell me lies
But don’t pass me dried apple pies.
C. — from Wednesday December 3, 1890, New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene NH) Vol XCII, Issue 49, Page 6
***ADDITIONAL READING***
The National Archives: Thanksgiving as American as Apple Pie
A White House Thanksgiving — a collection of holiday recipes of the American President’s families (scroll down to fine Ike and Mamie Eisenhower’s Deep Dish Apple Pie).
New Hampshire’s Missing Heirloom Apples
New Hampshire: Apples, Autumn and Heirloom Recipes
Poem: After Apple Picking, by Robert Frost
Poem: The Cow in Apple Time, by Robert Frost
