The Great Maple Syrup Caper

Crazy Food Crimes: The Great Maple Syrup Caper | FirstWeFeast.com

The Sweet Life of Pecans

In less than 100 years, pecan pie has cemented its sticky imprint as a treasured dessert, perpetually in America’s top five slices.*

While its earliest beginnings may date back to New Orleans settlers in the early 1700s, the key ingredient of corn syrup was not available until the 1880s, and quintessential American recipes didn’t appear until the 1900s. One of the first, “Texas Pecan Pie” in 1914’s Christian Science Monitor called for sweet milk, sugar, eggs, flour and pecan, and a meringue topping. But it wasn’t until 1931 when the creamy, crunchy and prodigiously sweet pecan pie we know today was baked up by the wife of a Karo sales executive, using a cup of the company’s corn syrup to produce the classic still known in the South as “Karo Pie.” A 1942 recipe for “Utterly Deadly Southern Pecan Pie,” using not-so-healthy doses of Southern cane syrup and white sugar, prompted this response from Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and passionate baker Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings in her Cross Creek Cookery book: “I have nibbled at this pie and served it to those in whose welfare I took no interest, but being inclined to plumpness, and having a desire to see out my days on earth, I have never eaten a full portion.” Her “Reasonable Pecan Pie,” filled with a thick custard, brown sugar, butter and pecans and a topping of sweetened whipped cream, is “deadly enough,” she admits.

Today’s recipes are even more lethal, gleefully ignoring calorie counts and sugar grams in search of the richest, gooey-est slices of sweetness imaginable. Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman) gives a recipe for pecan pie “that will make you cry,” promising “the most delectable, flavorful pecan pie on Earth” with finely tuned measures of standard ingredients (a cup of white sugar, 3 tbsp. brown sugar, ½ tsp. of salt, a cup of corn syrup, 3 eggs, 1/3 cup of butter, ¾ tsp. of vanilla), and a cup of very well chopped pecans. “Chopping the pecans makes such a difference and results in a nice, crunchy pie,” she says.

A loyal US Foods™ customer, Paula Deen’s Cinnamon Pecan Caramel Pie is made the traditional way, but the topping is off the pie charts, made from brown sugar, butter, heavy cream, ground cinnamon and of course, another cup of chopped pecans—one reviewer describes its taste as “like eating a candy bar.” Even more decadent is Deen’s famous “Bourbon Pecan Pie,” featuring 2 cups of pecan halves and an extra kick from two tablespoons of ‘good quality’ bourbon. “I like my pecan pie with a dollop of fresh whipped cream, a sprig of mint—you can’t get any simpler or better,” she asserts. 

Others swear by maple syrup instead of corn syrup, reinventing the pie with New England’s finest export, and adding brown sugar and molasses. As for Karo, they’ve expanded well beyond their famed classic pecan pie confection with no less than 45 different recipe versions, as varied as Black Forest Brownie, Peanut Butter, Cheescake, Crème de Menthe Fudge and Sweet Potato. Only pastry chef Gale Gand gives the sugar-restricted a shot at nirvana with her “No Sugar Pecan Pie” subbing in 5 teaspoons of Equal and a cup of sugar-free breakfast syrup.

Reimagining a classic American treat, pecan pie - created a trendy, all natural dessert bar so rich and delicious you’ll swear that they came straight from mom’s oven.

*Goodmind/Schwan’s 2008 survey showed only apple, chocolate crème, pumpkin and cherry bested it.

Oakley Restaurant Fined

Oakley restaurant fined after dishing up food before its time - http://bit.ly/TSXwhz.