• Work
  • About
  • News
Menu

Emily Hilliard

Folklorist | Writer | Media Producer
  • Work
  • About
  • News

Writing Clips

Cracker Pie: An American Classic →

July 27, 2013

When you see crackers in a pie recipe, you’re probably thinking crust—crushed graham crackers for Key Lime or Banana Cream, or maybe a saltine crust for the salty-tart Atlantic Beach Pie. But crackers in the filling? It doesn’t sound too appealing. Turns out, though, that Cracker Pie, a.k.a. Mock Apple Pie, is a classic American recipe, dating back to at least the mid-1800s. It’s mentioned in an 1858 letter from Henderson, Texas resident Sue Smith to her friend Bet. She writes,

"Bet I have learned to make a new kind of Pie I think you all would like them they taste just like an apple pie make some and try them see if you don’t love them… Take a teaspoon heaping full of tartarlic acid and dissolve it in water a teasp full of sugar and stir it in the acid then take cold biscuit or light bread and crumble in it."

Read on in The Runcible Spoon

In Folklore, Food, History, Recipes
← The Long Lost Recipes of Fergus "Flask" ShawState pie project: Michigan’s tart cherries →

Powered by Squarespace