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Quote by Janet Clarkson

“A pie is only as good as its pastry, and one of the delights of a good pie is the contrast in texture between the crisp pastry and the filling - whatever it might be. In a perfect pie, each component is independently perfect - the mouthfeel of the pastry (buttery, flaky, crumbly) and the mouthfeel of the filling (rich, unctuous, tender, sticky, crunchy, etc.); and the whole is more than the sum of its parts.”

Quote by Janet Clarkson

Book:Pie: A Global History

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Pie: A Global History

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“Pastry-making, as every amateur baker fears, is as much about technique as ingredients. The rationale behind the well-known advice to keep the hands, implements and kitchen cool while making pastry, to use minimal water and to handle it lightly is obvious, now that we understand the process. Cool handling lengthens the time that the fat in the dough stays solid; using minimum amount of water reduces the gluten content and also allows the dough to be crisper; minimal handling also reduces the gluten, so we do not knead pastry dough as we do bread.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Dough Food History Global History Pastry

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“There was no doubt in the minds of nineteenth-century cooks and cookbook writers that there was something about pie - a difficult to grasp something that made it universally esteemed in a way that cake or stew or soup was not.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“An outstanding historical feature of the pie is that it is a self-contained meal which can be eaten in the hand, without the need of cutlery, crockery or napery.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“We are social animals, and we don't usually find and eat food alone, so we associate it at an emotional level with people, events and circumstances. Eventually a food becomes embedded with meaning, allowing anthropologists to asks questions like: 'Do pies mean anything?”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“It is the food that looks backwards through our shared family memories. It is comfort food, the food inextricably linked in our cultural consciousness with motherhood and nationhood. Even though the pies are no longer a daily item on our dinner tables, they still figure large in many of our memories: pies mean Thanksgiving and Christmas and picnics and silly old Aunt Mabel and going to the football with Dad.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“The pie-cook and the pie-consumer are both lucky if the smell of the pie 'sells' not only its desirability as biological fuel but also remembrance of pies past.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“Therefore, humans were all created equally and are all the same. All blood runs red!”

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Book:Mixed Bloodline: The story of a young biracial boy overcoming racism growing up in the South doing the 1930's Jim Crow Era

Source: Mixed Bloodline: The story of a young biracial boy overcoming racism growing up in the South doing the 1930's Jim Crow Era

“A cook who has gone to extra trouble, who loves you enough not to just toss the stew onto a plate with a lump of bread, but to craft for it its own little pastry gift-box. Is this the crux of it?”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Global History

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“Wheat is the only grain with a significant amount of gluten, so we have our first clue to the origins of pastry. Superb pastry could only have developed where wheat was grown: rye, barley and oats do not make good pastry, nor do rice or maize or potato starch.”

Food Pie Baking Wheat Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Gluten Global History Pastry

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History

“The gluten content of the final wheat dough can be manipulated by the cook in a number of ways depending on the ultimate goal, whether it be sturdy bread or flaky pastry. (...) The first trick is to use exactly the right amount of water, for it is water that activates the gluten in flour. Fat is the second trick, and it helps the texture of pastry in a number of ways. Fat coats little packets of flour, waterproofing them and limiting the amount of water that gets in (less water, so less gluten), and it keeps the gluten strands 'short'. Little smears and gobbets of fat also separate the mini layers of dough, so that they form individual flakes or crumbs, not a solid mass.”

Food Pie Baking Food Writing Food Anthropology Food History Gluten Global History Pastry

Book:Pie: A Global History

Source: Pie: A Global History