Chess Pie

This custard-like pie is so easy to make, it’s practically sinful. It’s an old Southern recipe, and it’s wonderfully sweet—which makes it great to eat with coffee. It’s the one pie recipe I have memorized. Use your favorite crust recipe—or buy frozen crusts at the grocery store (for this recipe, they can go straight from frozen to the oven). It’s also easy to double or triple the recipe. I tripled it this week for a baby shower (2 pies for the shower, 1 pie for my husband), and thanks to my Kitchen Aid, making 3 pies was no harder than making 1 pie. Since I ended up bringing 1 whole pie back from the shower uneaten (a ratio of desserts to people thing—not a reflection on the pie!), it’s a good thing my husband loves this dessert.

Ingredients

4 eggs

1 cup sugar

¼ cup (1/2 stick) softened (not melted) butter

1 TBS cornmeal

1 TBS vinegar

1 TBS flour

1 tsp vanilla

1 pie crust

Mix everything (except the crust, heh heh) in your stand mixer until combined (a few minutes at medium speed). My butter never quite mingles with the rest of the ingredients, and I always have little chunks of it floating around—but that’s never hurt the outcome. Pour into pie crust, and bake at 350 for 45-55 minutes (55 min. usually for me), or until the top is turning golden-brown. If your crust starts to brown too much you can cover the crust with aluminum—but this has never happened to me with this recipe. It will be a little jiggly when it comes out, but don’t worry—everything will turn out OK in the end. Let it cool a bit—and then eat it! With coffee!