*****OLD FASHIONED PECAN PIE RECIPE AND HISTORY

Photo of the article

This information was sent to me as an attachment to an email.   This is great information.  There was so much to learn.   It was a treat to find someone who understood my interest in food as being more than idle curiosity.   I thoroughly enjoyed this article, a lot of which I have transcribed here for my readers.  The interesting part to me is also that my interest in this whole pecan pie thing started with my mother's cooking.   I found her cooking of sweet things to be over the top, but now I understand it in the context of finding a sweetener when sugar was actually being rationed.   The Karo Syrup invention occurred at the beginning of the last century, before two major World Wars, before the Roaring Twenties, before the 1929 Stock Market Crash, before the dust bowl of the 30s.   My mother never would have made the pie any other way.   All of the ingredients were highly valued, except maybe for the eggs, which would have been bought or traded from our neighbors the Howards, or harvested from the chicken coop we kept at our neighbor's house.
So thank you to the person who sent this to me.   I love the story and the recipe and will give you all a review once I have attempted to make it.
I also wondered if the woman who invented the pie recipe was ever given any recognition.

OLD-FASHIONED PECAN PIE RECIPE 

AND HISTORY

Corn syrup is convenient, but its tooth-aching sweetness can overpower the pecans.
Long before cloying Karo syrup was a gleam in the eye of its inventors, 19th-century homemakers were setting "transparent pies" to cool on windowsills.  Made with sugar, butter, and eggs and sweetened with molasses, maple, cane, or sorghum syrup, these pies resembled pecan pie without the nuts.   Then manufacturers came up with a flavorless, cheap liquid sugar made from highly processed cornstarch.  In 1902, the Corn Products Refining Company of New York and Chicago aggressively marketed it as karo corn syrup.  Three decades later, the wife of a Karo executive baked a transparent pie with the new-fangled syrup and added pecans.  The company printed her recipe in a promotional booklet, pie history was made, and Karo sales took off.

Cane syrup and sorghum syrup (the latter is made from a cereal grass) along with maple syrup were experimented with by this source.  Findings?  maple syrup, has a higher water content than corn syrup does.   Whole eggs bind less than double the yolks do (less water).

As far as the nuts go, toasting them before they went into the pie (10 minutes at 350 F, similar the almonds 3 to 6 minutes for them), allow for enough crunch and flavor.

In order to make sure the crust would cook, the cook started it at a high temp (450 degrees) and then turned down the dial to 325 F, also lowered the rack to make a crisp, golden bottom crust.

This recipe serves 8 to 10.  Regular or mild molasses tastes best in this pie.  Use your favorite pie dough or go to CooksCountry.com for our Single Crust Pie Dough recipe.

1 cup maple syrup
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 tbsp molasses (see note)
4 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1/2 tsp salt
6 large egg yolks, lightly beaten
1 1/2 cups pecans toasted and whole or chopped
1 nine inch unbaked pie shell chilled in pie plate for 30 minutes
1.  Adjust oven rack to lower position and heat oven to 450 degrees.  Heat syrup, sugar, cream and molasses in saucepan over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until sugar dissolves, about 3 minutes.   Remove from heat and let cool for 5 minutes.  Whisk butter and salt into syrup mixture until combined.  Whisk in egg yolks until incorporated.
2.  Scatter pecans in pie shell and pour filling over pecans.  Place pie in oven and reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees.   Bake until filling is set and center jiggles slightly when pie is shaken, 45 to 60 minutes.   Cool pie on rack for 1 hour, then refrigerate until set, about 3 hours and up to 1 day.  Bring to room temperature before serving with Bourbon Whipped Cream, if desired.

BOURBON WHIPPED CREAM
Makes about 2 cups

1 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp bourbon
1 1/2 tbsp packed light brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

With electric mixer on medium speed, beat all ingredients until stiff peaks form, about 2 minutes.   (Whipped cream can be refrigerated for 4 hours).

By Diane Unger from Best Country Recipes 2011

To be replaced with pie attempt
and photo

Thanks to the great friend who sent this too me.   Review will follow.