Sweet potato pie
"The most delicate root that may be eaten," as the sixteenth-century English mariner and slave trader John Hawkins called it, suited European taste. Henry VIII ate his sweet potatoes in heavily spiced and sugared pies, a fashion that survived at least until the 1680s."
It is normally made as a large tart. It doesn't have a top crust. The filling has mashed sweet potatoes, milk, sugar, eggs, and flavoring. The filling can be made light or dense. Occasionally marshmallows are added as a topping.
History[change | change source]
Creamy vegetable pie recipes date back to Medieval Europe. It was a favorite of Henry VIII of England. He was known to eat a great number of sweet potato pies at a time believing they were an aphrodisiac. Sweet potato pie appears in the southern United States from the early colonial days. Like many sweet potato recipes, sweet potato pie was likely developed by the black slaves from traditional African cuisine. It is a staple of Soul food today. Recipes for sweet potato pie first appeared in printed cookbooks in the 18th century. It was included with savory vegetable dishes. By the 19th century, sweet potato pie was considered a dessert.
References[change | change source]
- -The Potato: How the Humble Spud Rescued the Western World, Larry Zuckerman [North Point Press:New York] 1998 (p. 9)
- "Sweet potato pie". Lynne Olver. 2000. http://www.foodtimeline.org/foodpies.html#sweetpotatopie. Retrieved 23 November 2014.
- Bill Neal, Bill Neal's Southern Cooking (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989), p. 163
- Sheila Ferguson, Soul Food: Classic Cuisine from the Deep South (New York: Grove Press, 1993), p. 110