47 Fun Facts About Pie

The first known use of 'pie' (1303) is in the accounts of a priory in which English county?

Bolton Priory, in Yorkshire's Wharfedale, recorded the word in its 1303 accounts; 'pie' may derive from the magpie, a bird that collects odds and ends like a medieval pie's mixed fillings.

What was the medieval name for the stiff, often inedible pastry case that held a pie's filling?

A 'coffyn' (coffin) meant a basket or box; the thick case was a container that preserved the filling, while open-topped pies were called 'traps'.

The expression 'to eat humble pie' comes from a pie made with what?

'Umbles' were the innards; umble pie was food for the lowly.

Evidence of early sweet pastries appears on the tomb walls of which pharaoh?

He ruled from 1304 to 1237 BC; the first written Roman pie was rye dough filled with goat's cheese and honey.

Apple pie recipes were first recorded in the 14th century in which country?

The Forme of Cury gives a recipe with apples, figs, raisins and pears in a pastry 'cofyn'.

'For Mom and apple pie' was supposedly American soldiers' stock answer for why they fought in which war?

The Washington Post has argued the phrase should really be 'as American as a cobbler'.

A custard-style pumpkin pie first appeared in the cookbook American Cookery, published when?

Amelia Simmons's American Cookery, the first cookbook written by an American, appeared in 1796 and included two 'pompkin' pudding-in-crust recipes.

Key lime pie probably derives from a 1931 'Magic Lemon Cream Pie' recipe promoted by which condensed-milk maker?

Borden promoted the 'Magic Lemon Cream Pie' in a 1931 brochure for its Eagle Brand condensed milk; the acidic juice curdles yolks and milk so the filling sets without baking.

In 2006, Key lime pie was designated the official state pie of which state?

Florida statute 15.052 made Key lime pie official in July 2006.

Which state named pecan pie its official state pie in 2013?

Texas, whose state tree is the pecan, named pecan pie its official state pie in 2013; the earliest known recipe appeared in Harper's Bazaar in 1886.

Historically, mince pies were made with what?

Mince pies were meat pies: neat's tongue, beef, mutton and even tripe were minced with suet, dried fruit and spices, and Puritans attacked them as indulgent Catholic fare.

According to the PGI rules, a Cornish pasty must be crimped where?

PGI rules say a Cornish pasty is D-shaped and crimped along the curved side, filled with beef, potato, swede and onion; a top-crimped pasty is the Devon style.

Which Leicestershire town gives its name to Britain's most famous pork pie?

Melton Mowbray's pork-pie trade began around 1831 as a sideline in Edward Adcock's bakery; the pie uses a hand-raised hot-water crust and jellied stock and holds PGI status.

Purists say a shepherd's pie should contain which meat, as opposed to the beef in a cottage pie?

Shepherd's pie, named for the sheep-herder, uses lamb or mutton; 'cottage pie', first recorded in 1791, originally covered any minced meat and the two names were long interchangeable.

Pi Day was founded in 1988 by physicist Larry Shaw at which San Francisco institution?

Larry Shaw, an Exploratorium physicist, launched Pi Day in 1988 with staff marching around a circular space and eating fruit pies; the US House recognised the day in 2009.

Which liqueur flavours a grasshopper pie?

Grasshopper pie takes its name and green colour from crème de menthe, the mint liqueur in the grasshopper cocktail; the filling is usually folded with marshmallow or cream in a chocolate-cookie crust.

The pie-in-the-face gag was first seen on film in 1909's Mr. Flip, starring which comedian?

Ben Turpin took the first on-screen pie in Essanay's Mr. Flip (1909); Chaplin and Stan Laurel had already done the gag on stage in Fred Karno's troupe.

How many pies were used in Laurel and Hardy's 1927 pie fight, The Battle of the Century?

About 3,000 pies, a full day's output of the Los Angeles Pie Company, were thrown in The Battle of the Century; The Great Race (1965) later used 4,000 over five days.

Which tech billionaire was famously pied in Belgium in 1998?

Bill Gates took a cream pie from Belgian prankster Noël Godin's crew in Brussels in February 1998; Rupert Murdoch got a foam pie at a 2011 parliamentary hearing in London.

Banoffee pie was invented in 1971 at the Hungry Monk restaurant in which English county?

The Hungry Monk in Jevington, East Sussex, created banoffee pie in 1971; owner Nigel Mackenzie and chef Ian Dowding adapted a San Francisco coffee-toffee pie, and the name blends banana and toffee.

Which state made the whoopie pie its official state treat in 2011?

Maine named the whoopie pie its official state treat in 2011, keeping blueberry pie as state dessert; South Portland baked a 1,062-pound whoopie pie that same year.

Moon Pies are made in which Tennessee city?

Chattanooga Bakery has made the Moon Pie since 1917: two graham crackers, marshmallow and a coating, traditionally washed down with an RC Cola.

Boston cream pie, actually a custard-filled cake, is the official dessert of which state?

Massachusetts made Boston cream pie its official dessert in 1996; it was reportedly created at Boston's Parker House Hotel in 1856, when cakes and pies were baked in the same pans.

Shoofly pie, a Pennsylvania Dutch specialty, is made with which sweetener?

Shoofly pie's filling is molasses, brown sugar and crumbs; one theory says the name came from a popular 'Shoofly' brand of molasses rather than from flies drawn to the sweet filling.

Tourtière, a minced pork pie eaten at Christmas réveillon, comes from which Canadian province?

Tourtière is Quebec's Christmas Eve pie; French-Canadian immigrants carried it to New England mill towns in the late 19th century.

Stargazy pie, with fish heads poking through the crust, comes from which Cornish village?

Stargazy pie belongs to Mousehole, where it is eaten on Tom Bawcock's Eve (23 December) to celebrate the fisherman whose catch reputedly saved the village from starvation.

The pie floater, a meat pie served in thick pea soup, is a specialty of which Australian city?

Adelaide's pie carts have sold the pie floater since the 1890s; the National Trust declared it a South Australian Heritage Icon in 2003.

How many blackbirds were baked in the pie in the nursery rhyme Sing a Song of Sixpence?

Four and twenty blackbirds, though the first printed verse, from around 1744, had 'naughty boys' in the pie instead.

The Eskimo Pie ice cream bar was renamed what in 2020?

Dreyer's renamed the bar Edy's Pie in 2020; Danish-born Christian Nelson had created it in Onawa, Iowa, in 1920 for a boy torn between ice cream and chocolate.

Buko pie, made with young coconut and condensed milk, is a specialty of which country?

Los Baños in Laguna province is famous for it.

Which Australian invention of 1949 seals a sandwich into a pie-like pocket over a fire?

The jaffle iron, patented in 1949 by Dr Ernest Smithers of Bondi, clamps a sandwich into a sealed toasted pocket; Smithers had earlier invented the Surfoplane.

Which sweetener forms the bulk of a treacle tart's filling?

A treacle tart is filled with golden syrup mixed with breadcrumbs and lemon, not black treacle; Lyle's golden syrup, first sold in 1883, made the dish a British staple.

The upside-down tarte Tatin is named after two sisters who ran a hotel in which country?

The Tatin sisters ran the Hôtel Tatin in Lamotte-Beuvron, France; legend says an overworked Stéphanie Tatin created the caramelised upside-down tart by accident in the 1880s.

A 1450 recipe for 'grete pyes' contained which of these among its odds and ends?

The 1450 'grete pyes' recipe called for herons and storks along with beef, capons, mallard, teal, rabbits, woodcocks, marrow, egg yolks, dates, raisins and prunes.

A Bakewell tart from Derbyshire layers jam beneath which filling?

Bakewell tart is shortcrust spread with jam under an almond frangipane, finished with flaked almonds or icing; it grew out of the older Bakewell pudding.

In which city was the Dutch cookbook holding a 1514 recipe for appeltaerten printed?

Een notabel boecxken van cokeryen, printed in Brussels around 1514 by Thomas van der Noot, holds an early recipe for appeltaerten, apple pies.

Which Midwestern state claims sugar cream pie, a Quaker-linked custard of cream, sugar and flour?

Sugar cream pie became Indiana's official state pie in 2009; Amish and Quaker cooks there have made the eggless custard of cream, sugar and flour since the 1800s, earning it the nickname Hoosier pie.

Which region's cuisine gave the world pâté chaud, a puff-pastry savoury meat pie?

Pâté chaud (bánh patê sô) is Vietnam's French-influenced puff-pastry pork pie, a legacy of the colonial era and a popular bakery snack.

The earliest known pie chart appears in the 1801 Statistical Breviary of which pioneer of statistical graphics?

William Playfair used one to show how much of the Turkish Empire lay in Asia, Europe and Africa; Florence Nightingale later adapted the form into her 'rose' diagrams.

Don McLean's handwritten 'American Pie' lyrics sold at auction in April 2015 for about how much?

$1.2 million bought the lyrics and notes, whose catalogue finally confirmed the song climaxes with the killing at the Altamont Free Concert, ten years after the 1959 plane crash.

Which singer's shortened 2000 cover of 'American Pie' topped the UK singles chart?

Madonna cut it for her film The Next Best Thing after co-star Rupert Everett talked her into it; McLean called it 'a gift from a goddess', NME 'sub-karaoke fluff'.

Which corn syrup brand's makers claimed pecan pie was a 1930s 'discovery' by a sales executive's wife?

Karo's claim is shaky: a pecan custard pie recipe ran in Harper's Bazaar back in 1886, and older versions used molasses or dark sugar syrup.

Pie Town, host of a September Pie Festival on US Highway 60, is in which state?

New Mexico's Pie Town sits in Catron County, just down the road from the Very Large Array radio telescope.

Which silent film star made his own pork pie hats by stiffening fedora brims with sugar water?

Buster Keaton's trick turned fedoras into flat pork pies; the style began as women's wear in the 1860s and had its menswear heyday in the Great Depression.

The tinned steak-and-kidney pie brand Fray Bentos takes its name from a port in which country?

Fray Bentos is a river port in Uruguay where Liebig's Extract of Meat Company opened a plant in the 1860s; the name meant corned beef long before tinned pies, whose UK range Baxters bought in 2011.

Weird Al's unreleased parody 'Chicken Pot Pie' reworks which Paul McCartney and Wings song?

'Chicken Pot Pie' parodies Wings' 'Live and Let Die' (1973); McCartney, a strict vegetarian, declined to approve a song about eating meat, so it was never released on an album.

Which English monarch is traditionally credited with receiving the first recorded cherry pie?

Elizabeth I is traditionally credited with the first recorded cherry pie; fruit pies spread in the 16th century as sugar got cheaper, and she was routinely given quince and pear pies at New Year.