Pie

Writing from the barn. The sun is at three hands from the horizon and starting to turn gold, along with the leaves which also adorn speckles of reds, burgundies and pumpkin oranges.

Yvonne is laughing at me because my hat and my computer clash with the barn and the banjo.


I made pie today. For the first time. Apple pie. I've been too afraid to make it because my mum said she tried to make pie pastry once and it was inedible. But then I realized she'd only tried ONCE. And she's KNEW what she'd done wrong.

But nevertheless, I was nervous. Partly because I had never done it before, partly because I was bringing it to a potluck at my first intern-network meeting, me being the "new kid in class." But I was mostly nervous because I was using lard. Lard that I had rendered myself, and surely something that I did from scratch by taking instructions from books and the internet wasn't Actually going to work. I was afraid the faint (very faint!) porky smell would clash with the apples. When the lard flaked apart rather than broke like butter or shortening, I began to doubt the quality of the lard... Maybe it would make everyone sick. Or it would just be a disaster and I'd have wasted Yvonne's time who was making the filling, and wasted Caitlin's time who let us make something instead of work... and we'd have to make something else for the potluck tomorrow... all a waste...

I used a recipe left behind by Caitlin's mum (a pie-master). It called for a cup of lard and two cups flour, but it seemed a little dry so I put in a little more lard. I did that and looked at other recipes, they all called for less lard. The pastry was also yellow, but that was the egg. A real farm egg, with an orange yolk, not a yellow yolk.

I rolled out the pastry and recalled seeing my dad doing this many times before, perhaps I had even rolled it out on occasion. It stuck to the counter so I rolled it again, but remembered that dad says he usually rolls it twice so I wasn't too worried. The second roll went well, as well as the top, and the rolls I made for a mini-pie (to test so that I didn't have to blindly feed a bunch of other farm interns poisonous rock-pie) went well too. With an awkward combination of hesitation and blind faith I threw the pies into the oven.

After ten minutes, it smelled pretty good.

...Pretty goddamn good.

The crust started to brown earlier than it said it would, so I took the test pie out of the oven and poked it. The crust acted like pie crust. Like really flaky, buttery (well, lardy), light, crusty pie crust. So I ate it. It burnt my mouth so I couldn't taste it. So I slowed down and took another bite.

It was goddamn delicious. Really... goddamn good.

One gets the impression that this pie has taken on a life of its own. Like it's one of the barnyard animals... I suppose in a way it is... or, it was. Part of one anyway.

That pie for the potluck better still be there tomorrow.

I need more pig lard. Maybe I'll go into business. The lard business.

GLYNIS' PIE CRUST
Stolen from Marilyn Hall

2 cups pastry flour
1 cup leaf lard (I talk about rendering fat in the Driftwood Quarterly, Vol. I. No. II)
3/4 tsp salt

1 egg
2 Tbsp water
1 Tbsp vinegar

Cut lard into flour and salt until it pebbles up into pea-sized bits. Combine wet ingredients with a fork. Pour onto flour and lard and mix JUST until everything is combined. Make a ball of the dough and chill in the fridge. Pour a bunch of flour on the counter or table, and place chilled pastry dough on it. Flour up the rolling pin (or wine bottle) and roll out into round shape and desired thickness. If desired, or if it's too delicate to lift, fold it into a ball and roll out again. To lift into pie pan, fold in half, lift and place, fold it out again.

Once the pie filling is in and the top is on, bake at 450 for ten minutes, and then drop the temperature to 350 for the remaining time, until the edges begin to brown, about 25-45 minutes.