Midwest Pie: Recipes that Shaped a Region

Pangrace (Rust Belt Vegan Kitchen) culls 56 pies from family recipes and community cookbooks for a slim collection that works better as a historical archive than as guidance for home bakers. Recipes have been left largely intact on purpose; the sparse ingredients and brief instructions in many reflect their hardscrabble origins, from Amish farm life to the Great Depression. An informative introduction from Belt Publishing’s publicity director Phoebe Mogharei traces the rise of pie in the Midwest with waves of immigration and changing economic times. Chapters encompass “Desperation” pies, which include a recipe taken from a package of Ritz crackers; pies using local Midwestern ingredients, including black walnut and chokecherry; and “Retro Favorites,” including a “self-frosting” lemon pie. Pangrace’s brief and inconsistent intros provide origin stories for some recipes (“Shoofly Pie,” for example, was invented by the Pennsylvania Dutch), but others, like the intriguingly named “Millionaire Pie,” go unexplained. Most glaringly, the flavor descriptions are too sparse and vague to tell whether the pies are worth baking: vinegar pie is pronounced “surprisingly delicious”; the clove and cinnamon that spice a custard pie make it “unique”; and cottage cheese pie is a “specialty of grandmothers”—but should it be attempted? This has niche appeal, but not much to entice the average home baker. (May)