I thought I had seen, or tasted every possible recipe for sauerkraut.
But the other day I came across a new use for sauerkraut: a cream pie. The idea came from Marcia Adams, who grew up in Fort Wayne, Ind., prime pie-making country. She has also written a number of cookbooks, and has a TV cooking show.
Ms. Adams tracks down old ways to cook family favorites. She calls them "attic recipes," ones that are passed down from generation to generation. She found the recipe for sauerkraut pie at the Ohio Sauerkraut Festival in Waynesville, Ohio, and put it in her latest cookbook "Marcia Adam's Heirloom Recipes" (Potter, $22.50). I am a fan of Ms. Adams'. Her first cookbook, "Cooking From Quilt Country" is used so often in our house, the pages have food stains.
Nonetheless, I was skeptical about sauerkraut pie. I had never heard of the fermented cabbage being used as dessert. Of course, until I moved here, I had never heard of the Baltimore practice of serving sauerkraut with Thanksgiving turkey, either.
So I checked with a sauerkraut source about this pie.
I called Francie George, whose family has been running Haussner's Restaurant in East Baltimore about as long as cabbage has been on the face of the Earth. Haussner's is a temple of kraut. It goes through about 200 pounds a week. It also makes and sells a lot of pies. If any place in Baltimore were serving sauerkraut pie, Haussner's would be it.
Ms. George had never heard of such a pie. But being a sauerkraut savant, she was interested in how the pie was made. When I told her you mixed the kraut with sugar, butter, flour and cornmeal, she said the sauerkraut would have to be fresh, not the kind sold in cans.
When I met briefly this week with Ms. Adams, who was in Baltimore promoting her new book, she praised the kraut-filled pie. She said that cooks could make the pie using either homemade kraut, kraut sold in so called "fresh-packs" in the refrigerated cases of grocery stores, or canned kraut. The best flavor, she said, came from homemade kraut. In the pie, sauerkraut tasted "just like coconut," she said.
Ms. Adams also had an answer for the question that had been bothering me: Why would somebody make sauerkraut pie in the first place? Someone had a lot of sauerkraut left over, she said.
Ohio Sauerkraut Pie
Makes 2 9-inch pies
pastry for two 9-inch single pie crusts
1/2 cup sauerkraut
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
2 cups sugar
5 large eggs, well beaten
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons yellow cornmeal
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Roll out the pie crust on a floured surface and line 2 pie pans; set aside.
Drain kraut and rinse with cold water, then squeeze dry and set aside. In a mixer bowl, cream butter and sugar thoroughly, about a minute. Add eggs, milk, vanilla and lemon juice and blend. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and cornmeal. Add flour mixture to the egg mixture and blend; fold into kraut. Pour into the unbaked pie shells.
Bake for 55 to 60 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely before serving.
Pie Pastry
Makes 2 9-inch pie crusts
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1 3/4 cups butter-flavored vegetable shortening
1 large egg
1 tablespoon cider vinegar
1/2 cup water
Combine flour, sugar, salt and shortening in a large bowl and blend until it has the texture of coarse crumbs. In a small bowl, beat together egg, vinegar and water. Drizzle over the flour mixture and mix thoroughly. Shape dough into a patty, wrap in plastic wrap, and place in freezer 45 minutes or refrigerate overnight.
To prepare dough for pies, form it into long roll, divide into quarters, and wrap each portion separately and refrigerate or freeze.