The Great American Pie Tour

As Easy as Eating Pie

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As presented in Grafton's Valley Messenger. Read Latest Edition

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Beginning 16 Feb 2022 at Cold Brew Café 53 Armidale St.,
(Armidale St. and Cambridge St.) South Grafton, NSW.

Pecan Pie: Algonquin for “Nut”

Here’s a Recap:

One of our regular customers told us he longs to drive across the United States, stop at diners along the road and just eat pie. Oh boy, what a great trip that would be! But, we thought, why go all the way to the States when we could do that right here in South Grafton! This is a tour of America’s most beloved food: pie.

On our Great American Pie Tour: Easy as Eating Pie so far, we’ve made and thoroughly enjoyed these pies that American’s love best:

#1 Apple
#2 Pumpkin
#3 Chocolate
And America’s 9th favourite pie, Key Lime.

Now, we want a popular pie that is also a pure American creation right down to its roots. “What pie is that?" you ask. Pecan Pie*!

Pecan pie is #4 on American’s Favourite Pie list. And you may wonder why we were waiting to bring this warm, sweet, salty, creamy, nutty, wonderful pie to you. We were holding off for Pecan Season, and now it’s here!

The Pecan Tree is native to North America, first growing along the banks of the Mississippi River. The Native American people used to propagate them. The word pecan comes from the French, pecane, which is the derivation of the Algonquin word, pagan, meaning “nut”.

Recipes for Pecan Pie started cropping up in Texas cookbooks around the 1870’s. However, it was when the Karo’s Corn Syrup Company published a recipe for Pecan Pie on its label in the 1920s that the Pecan Pie became a household favourite. Harvesting season for pecans in the States is October thru December, the perfect time for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

The peak harvest season for pecans here in New South Wales is March thru June! So, let’s make pie!

The roots of our pecan pie recipe comes from my mother’s copy of (The) Joy of Cooking by Irma S. Rombauer, originally published in 1936. Our copy was the most popular edition sold, the 6th edition, published in 1975. This cookbook has my mother’s handwriting all over it, with notes, changes and pieces of paper. It even smells like her cigarettes when you open it. The cookbook is a beloved old thing and has one of the best recipes for pecan pie we’ve ever had!

We are serving Pecan Pie at Cold Brew Café for the next two weeks! Come and give it a try. Perfect with tea or our beautiful coffee.

You can find posts of our recipe progress, "tips and secrets” and other updates on our FaceBook page @coldbrewcafeaustralia. Search #greatamericanpietour to find our past posts and pies on the Great American Pie Tour and look for the final Pecan Pie recipe in the next printing of the Valley Messenger.

We look forward to seeing you!

*We grieve with our oldest, dearest friends, the Quinn’s’, who mourn the loss of their daughter and sister Sue. This was her favourite pie. This one’s for you, Sue!

Colleen "Matty" Schaefer is partner and baker, Cold Brew Café, 53 Armidale St., South Grafton, NSW 2460.

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Pecan Pie Recipe

What a delightful challenge to get this pie right! Though the Joy of Cooking Recipe had the right sweetness but relied too heavily on corn syrup and wasn’t quit as great we remembered. So we went to our favourite Chef John recipe for Pecan Pie, which is a little more complicated but so, so much better.
The biggest problem we had was making corn syrup out of glucose syrup. It’s done by thinning the syrup with water. The best consistency was to pour out 250g of glucose syrup and add 93 millilitres of water. Stir very well. You’ll need ½ cup of this to make your pie. Our preference was to pulse the pecans in the food processor or to chop them up a bit which makes the pie easier to cut and easier to eat. By the way, this would work beautifully with walnuts! ;-)

Paté Brisee

This recipe makes 2 crusts for 9” pie or 1 full crust pie.
Split dough into two crusts by 340g per crust and freeze one for later.

Weigh, cut into ½” pieces and freeze a minimum of 15 minutes but more is better
250g Butter

In the bowl of a food processor fitted with blades pulse 10 times

340g AP Flour
1 ½ t Salt
1 t Sugar

Add Frozen butter pulse 12 more times
Add ½ C water pulse 12 more times.

Butter should be small pea size
Dump crust mix into a bowl to finish flour distribution.

Divide dough into two disks and refrigerate for minimum 1 hour.

Roll out dough to ⅛” thick and place in pie pan, crimp crust.
Set aside

Pecan Pie

Preheat oven 160℃ fan forced
200g pecans halves or pieces spread on baking sheet, lightly toasted 7 to 8 minutes, cool, chop to favourite consistency and spread out in bottom of the crust.

Mix together and then bring to a boil:
1 Cup (200g) brown sugar
½ Cup (114g) Butter
½ Cup (100g) white sugar
½ Cup corn syrup (see above)
3 Tablespoons AP Flour
2 Tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon salt

Remove from heat and rest for 10 minutes then slowly add while whisking
3 large eggs whisked

Pour sugar mixture over nuts and gently stir with spatula to thoroughly coat pecans.

Bake pie until rust is golden brown and pie is set, 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool completely but pie is best at room temperature.

Enjoy!

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