Strawberry Pie Forever!

A different recipe for great pie

No, this is not “Strawberry Fields Forever,” (the Beatle’s song), but the berries I picked yesterday morning are in my hands now, and in the freezer, and in an awesome new strawberry pie for which I uncovered a recipe I had never noticed before.

The recipe book was one my mother’s generation made at North Goshen Mennonite Church in Indiana where I grew up. The names in this cookbook are special to me, conjuring up women who I had long ago forgotten. Erma Slabaugh. Pauline Beachy, Cleo Yoder, Nora Bender, Betty Stringfellow, Alma Yoder. Mary Mininger. These women, and a tribe of others, had brought me up, taught my Sunday School classes, saw me through MYF for three years of high school.

Oh my, wouldn’t they all love to see their names published on the Internet! (Ha!) I hope the recipe book still sits on a library shelf at North Goshen Church. (Someone tell me, yes!)

I’ll give you Erma Slabaugh’s interesting (and brief) recipe in a minute, but I hope you can be remembering more women—and a few men—who were excited to have their “receipts” in print (as some of them used to say. Google the truth of that).

More women who shared recipes back in the mid-60’s. “Phyllis Schrock. Ruth Swartzentruber. Alberta Troyer. Lizzie Weaver.” Oh my goodness, what memories. I won’t go on, but the yellowed “Fellowship Cooking,” compiled by North Goshen Ladies Fellowship, should follow me to my grave, I reckon.

We made the best Raised Doughnuts from recipes in the cookbook, one from Sue Christner. And I was super elated when my sweet wonderful daughters, some 13 years ago, surprised me by making a huge batch of Raised Donuts for my 60^th birthday (instead of a cake), held in the fellowship hall (no not at North Goshen) but in Harrisonburg, Va. (In our Presbyterian church. Roll over my friends, yes, I turned Pressie, as my sister Pert would say about me and her other Presbyterian long time friend.)

Okay, here’s the “new” recipe I unearthed in the Pie section of Fellowship Cooking, meant to cover an etc. of fruits: Strawberry, Red Raspberry, Peach, according to Erma.

FRESH FRUIT PIES

2 c. fruit|
1/8th teas. salt|
1 c. sugar
4 Tab. flour

Mix together. Put in unbaked pie shell. Put on top your crust and bake in 425 degrees oven until done (NO!! My insertion here, see Below). For 9 inch pie. –Erma Slabaugh

***

My changes: Okay, all went well, but I took it upon myself to change the cooking temperature, and brought it down from 425 to 350 degrees after about 15 minutes in the oven. Erma never did give a cooking time, but I went with my tried and true 45-50 minutes for a pie like that, watching carefully.

My husband and I loved it, even though it looks different that way.

THEN I DISCOVERED WHERE THE OTHER STRAWBERRY PIE RECIPES COULD BE FOUND!

There are four in this cookbook, one pie with a pint of vanilla ice cream in it! In all 4, strawberry recipes for a cook’s sampling!

And just for the record, Erma Slabaugh was the mother of Rosemary who was a good friend of my oldest sister, Nancy. Rosemary’s father was Jacob and she loved swimming in our pond on Sunday afternoon. IF we didn’t get any blood suckers.

I think I’ll love strawberry pies forever!