Tipsy Transparent Pie

December 22, 2018

You hear an awful lot about transparency these days – in business and government, in education and on the internet. But there’s a type of transparency that’s dreadfully overlooked and needs many more champions, so I’m counting on you. It’s called transparent pie. Transparent pie is to Kentucky what chess pie is to the Carolinas and a handful of Southern states – a simple pie made from everyday ingredients you’d have on hand if the pantry were almost bare. Unlike…

Recipes, Sweet Pies

Maple Butter Tarts

December 14, 2018

Canadian butter tarts courtesy Ken Haedrich dean of The Pie Academy

What with all the holiday fun and festivities swirling about, you’d be forgiven if your plans for National Maple Syrup Day – December 17th – were still a bit up in the air. So let me help: why not mark the occasion with a batch of these Maple Butter Tarts? My friends in Canada, where butter tarts are something of a national obsession, won’t argue with my suggestion, though I understand they sometimes fuss amongst themselves over what makes for…

Recipes, Savory Pies

Watch the Savory Thanksgiving Dinner Pies Replay Now

November 20, 2018

This past Sunday I hosted a live streaming event from my home kitchen, a class on incorporating your Thanksgiving leftovers into savory dinner pies. Thought these might come in handy, what with holiday guests coming and all. I had a great time doing this event. It’s a little scary working without a script because you never know what might fly out of your mouth, or what you might drop on the floor, or cut yourself with. It can be embarrsing,…

Fruit Pies, Recipes

Apple and Pear Pie with Hot Pepper Jelly

August 31, 2018

Recipe courtesy of Ken Haedrich, dean of The Pie Academy

I had a bubbly email this week from a Pie Academy member about a recipe of mine that I hadn’t thought of in eons. This happens periodically. Someone will reach out and mention a recipe, an article, or something else I wrote about years ago, and jog my memory. I always welcome these reminders, unless it’s to point out that I’ve contradicted myself with something I’ve written more recently, leaving me no choice but to reach into my bag of…

News, Recipes, Savory Pies

Crème Fraîche Corn Quiche

July 28, 2018

Creme Fraiche Corn Quiche from The Harvest Baker by Ken Haedrich

This is not the first fresh corn pie recipe you’ve seen here at The Pie Academy and it probably won’t be the last, though, sadly, it will be the last for 2018. Sigh… Forgive me for sulking, but it’s a measure of my love for fresh corn that I can bemoan the passing of corn season even while we’re still in the midst of one. The three dozen ears Bev and I steamed, cut, and tucked away in the freezer…

Fruit Pies, Sweet Pies

Fresh Peach and Cherry Pie

June 30, 2018

Fresh Peach & Cherry Pie courtesy of Ken Haedrich and ThePieAcademy.com

Like so many well-meaning cooks today, I spend my share of time clicking on and collecting recipes I fancy I’ll make one day. Cooking-wise, the online-curator me is a lot more impressive and adventurous than the actual me, a reality gap, they tell me, not uncommon to online dating sites. Anyway, my obsession du jour is, understandably, peaches, which – if my crammed virtual recipe boxes are any indication – I soon intend to brandy, churn (ice cream), poach, ice…

Fruit Pies, Recipes

The Freezer Fruit Pie Challenge: Your Photos and Stories and our Top Picks

June 3, 2018

The Pie Academy Freezer Fruit Pie Challenge

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote here about rummaging through my post-winter freezer and digging out little baggies of frozen fruit to make a pie. Frugal chap that I am, I wanted to use up these remnants before starting a new fresh fruit pie season. I challenged you to do the same, and to send along photos of your creations. I called it the Freezer Fruit Pie Challenge. A number of you did – like Chad Nelson, whose Triple…

Fruit Pies, News, Recipes

The Freezer Fruit Pie Challenge

May 12, 2018

Freezer Fruit Pie at The Pie Academy.com

No sooner had I posted last week’s story about Blueberry Buttermilk Pie than I began to feel a little twitch of guilt about purchasing fresh blueberries for said pie. Yes, they were only a few bucks. But I’m a frugal by osmosis. The son of depression era parents simply doesn’t waste frozen fruit, even odd little baggies of it scattered across the freezer like castoffs from a doomed Arctic expedition. So I took a vow and challenged myself – and…

Fruit Pies, Recipes

Blueberry Buttermilk Pie

May 6, 2018

We’re still a few weeks away from spring blueberries here in coastal North Carolina, and being a patient sort of fellow I typically don’t mind the wait. But this past week I found myself in the thrall of some long distance berries I simply couldn’t resist. I’d gone to the market with no intention of jumping the season and making a blueberry pie. In fact I’d settled, happily, on a buttermilk one, intending to skip the fruit altogether during these…

Recipes, Savory Pies

Swiss Chard Galette

March 31, 2018

My wife Bev and I just returned from a trip to Charlottesville, Virginia where I was a speaker at the 2018 Virginia Festival of the Book. As Bev will attest, it’s often difficult (maddening is the term she’d probably use) to get me out the door and away from my desk and kitchen. For better or for worse, as I’ve mentioned before, I’m something of a homebody. Yet when I do wrest myself away – usually for some work-related reason…