Notes

The first yell was out of frustration. The pie I’d spent all morning making was now upside down and in chunks, splats, and smudges on the floor. The second yell was out of pain; some of those chunks, splats, and smudges had landed on my bare shins and were burning my legs as they slid down my ankles.

Emma ran in. “What just happened?”

As if the blood-red cherry mess all over my feet and the floor didn’t tell the story.

“I’ve got butterfingers,” I replied.

“Are you okay?” Emma wet a dishtowel and started mopping up the filling on my legs.

“Yeah, I just feel kind of dumb and angry.” I began to think about how weird it was that my babysitter was washing my feet while I was just standing there like a statue, melting.

“Your mom is going to kill me,” Emma said, as she observed the ruined-pie-like red marks. She sat back on her knees, and the seat of her jeans settled into a pile of cherry goo. I laughed.

“Ugh, gross. Now I’m going to kill you,” she said. Then she laughed, too. “Come on, let’s get some ice on those shins. I’ll clean up in here later.”

That pie was the third in a series of experiments I was conducting. I was looking for the perfect recipe to submit to the Carter County Fair’s baking contest. I was entering for the first time, though I’d been a pie taster my entire life. Well, at least since I’d had teeth.

My parents never baked much, but they had always taken me to the fair, and our family’s favorite event was the pie-baking competition. After the judges take bites out of each entry, they open up the judging room to fairgoers wanting to chime in on the decision. The biggest prize is the judge’s “best overall,” but it’s no small thing to earn a “people’s choice” ribbon.

There are a lot of categories: unique flavor, best-looking pie, best cream pie, best fruit pie…but I wanted to be the best overall. I knew I was going up against grandmas who had been making pies since they were girls, and there’s one professional baker in our little town— she’s young, but she learned how to cook in a real restaurant kitchen. I believed I had a shot anyways.

Not that my first few attempts at pie-baking were very hopeful. They weren’t. On my first try, I thought I’d make coconut cream. Here’s the entry in my pie diary from later that evening:

I guess I didn’t know that a graham-cracker crust was so difficult to make. I didn’t crush the crackers enough, so the chunks kind of floated around the filling…and the filling was awful. I forgot to add sugar, and only half of it solidified, so when I took it out of the oven, some of the liquid parts washed over the side of the pie tin and curdled on the floor. Good thing this was only a trial. Next!

So, that was a failure. But I’m a plucky girl (that’s what Mom calls me sometimes) and I know that practice makes perfect pie, so I found another recipe book and tried my hand at a basic apple. Again, from the pie diary:

Well, deciding on apple pie in the middle of summer was a silly idea. The only apples I could find were the horrible, cardboard-tasting red ones at the grocery store. I bought them anyway. I’ll get to that later; first, the crust. I’ve never made a crust, and the recipe was sort of unclear: what does “cut in butter” mean? I wrecked a pair of scissors before Emma came into the kitchen. My crust turned out okay, even though I added too much water at first (sticky mess). The filling, though, wasn’t good. The apples tasted like nothing even though I added sugar and spices. Plus the crust was too thin on the bottom and my slice fell apart during dessert.

The combination of these two tries led me to steer clear of graham-cracker crusts and gooey cream fillings, and to pick fruit that’s in season.

CHERRIES! I saw them at the farmers’ market in town today, and that’s the best idea I’ve had for a pie so far. As long as I can keep my crust from melting in the bottom of my pie pan…

I pasted a recipe clipped from a library cookbook (don’t tell!) into my pie diary and got to work. And that’s how I ended up in the kitchen with cherry pie filling burning my shins, my daytime babysitter shoveling a red mound off the floor with a spatula. I was a week out from baking the real thing, and my latest test run was in pieces—and not neatly sliced pieces.

“Never mind,” said Emma, seeing my face squish as I sniffed. “We can make another trial pie tomorrow. You’re going to be okay.”

We cleaned up the mess, and the next day, Emma came over as my parents left for work with an armful of groceries: a bag of cherries, a sack of flour, and two sticks of butter. Together, we started on my fourth trial pie, and I scribbled in my pie diary after setting the dough in the fridge to chill:

Emma is the best babysitter ever. Hopefully this latest pie works out, and I’ll be ready to make the real thing for the fair.

In an hour, I had my filling resting in a bowl: cherries and sugar and a little bit of vanilla. Emma told me when to stop rolling out my bottom crust so that it wasn’t too thin—“STOP, Liana, STOP”—and I got the oven ready to go. The last thing I did was cut a heart shape into the top crust before putting the pie in to bake. When it was done, the crust a golden brown, I asked Emma to take it out for me.

“Oooohhh, it’s beautiful,” I said. Emma didn’t drop it, and we barely waited for it to cool before scooping a slice out to try. It was fantastic.

This is the winner. This is the pie that is going to get me best overall at the fair! I’m so excited. I can’t wait for Friday.

The Friday of the fair, everyone had to drop off their entries by three. I woke up extra early to bake my pie, and I did it just as Emma had shown me. By the time she came over, I was finished. My parents wished me good luck as they headed to their respective offices. Emma and I played Scrabble until the pie was cool enough to transport.

Judging wouldn’t happen until after work, so Emma and I walked around and ate kettle corn and looked at animals and napped on some picnic tables. Mom and Dad promised they’d be there by 5:30, and they showed up right on time. Men and women wearing official badges came by and cut slices to pass down the judges’ table. As they nibbled, the rest of us were allowed to sample and cast our votes.

There was a pie with a top crust assembled to look like a Celtic knot, and I scribbled down a vote for that one in the “best presentation” category. It tasted fine. The best-tasting pie was a blueberry pie, but it looked awful. The berries had bubbled right out of the holes in the top of the crust, as well as out the seams. The plate stuck to the table. Most of the pies looked nice, and tasted nice, too.

I still thought I had a chance.

At least until I arrived at the last three pies. Boom, boom, boom, and the top three pies at the fair were decided. They were the three I had tested myself: a dreamy coconut cream, a homey apple, and a glimmering cherry. My parents tried to console me as we drove home, but I frowned all the way to bed. The official results would be announced the next morning at the fair, and I didn’t even want to return.

Of course, my parents made me go anyway. And sure enough, as I approached what remained of my pie on the display table, there was no ribbon. The three pies at the end of the table had won first, second, and third prize, as I’d predicted. Some old ladies came up and congratulated me on participating, and I shook their hands even though what I felt like doing was launching my pie into the air.

I waited until I was outside to do that.

A quarter of my cherry pie remained in the pan when I pitched it hard against a scarecrow guarding the door to the pie-judging building. The tin fell off after a moment, and all that remained was a big red mess on the scarecrow’s burlap face.

Mom and Dad stood in the doorway. I turned around to look at them. Dad opened his mouth as if to yell... and then he laughed. And then Mom laughed. And then I laughed, in spite of it all.

Okay, so I lost. The winning pies really were the best. I guess I’ll just have to keep trying. I did not get into trouble with the fair officials for staining their scarecrow, thankfully. They thought it was funny. I’m grateful, and will never try a stunt like that again. Oh, yeah, and I was right on the money—the Celtic knot pie won best-looking.