A Rosey Corner Favorite Pie

In a post on my Facebook Author Page last week, I asked what pie people liked to see on their holiday table. That grabbed people’s interest and I had many comments. I was a little surprised that lemon may have been the most popular answer. I’m not sure why I was surprised since I love lemon pie. Other favorites were pecan. A few mentioned rhubarb (without the strawberries) and there was even mentions of cushaw pie and mincemeat. With each mention I read, I was ready to claim that one as a favorite. I do love pie.

Reading all those comments made me remember a pie nobody mentioned – the brown sugar pie I had as a part of my Rosey Corner books. A few did mention butterscotch pie which is more or less brown sugar pie. The Rosey Corner brown sugar pie made its first appearance in Angel Sister, my first Rosey Corner book.

Here is the scene. Kate and Evie are sisters. Evie is oldest but Kate is the one who is generally the most responsible acting sister even if she’s only 14. Their church has a visiting preacher for the Sunday service and because he’s young and handsome, Evie invites him to eat dinner with them after church.  Kate is appalled since their mother isn’t home and they don’t have a Sunday dinner waiting. Here’s the scene.

Kate grabbed Evie’s arm and pulled her to the side.  “Evie, are you out of your mind?” Kate whispered in her ear.  “We don’t have anything ready to eat.  Nothing for a preacher anyway.  Bologna and cheese and leftover bean soup.  We can’t ask him to come eat that.”

“Mama might have cooked something else,” Evie said.

“Mama went to Grandfather Reece’s early this morning so Carla could come to church, remember?  She won’t be back until suppertime.”

“She made a brown sugar pie yesterday.  She left it in the pie safe.  I saw it this morning.  That’s preacher food.”  Evie lifted her chin and stared at Kate. 

From then on, the pie made frequent appearances, especially after Jay showed up as a character in the second book, Small Town Girl. He loved Kate’s mother’s brown sugar pie. Then the pie made even more appearances in the third book,  Love Comes Home. Here’s one of the brown sugar pie scenes in that book. Jay has just come home from the war and of course, Kate’s mother bakes him his favorite pie. Lorena is Kate’s little sister.

When it was time for dessert, Mama sat a whole brown sugar pie in front of Jay. “I thought maybe you would want to slice your own piece.” She handed him the knife.

Jay smiled at Mama. “Nadine, I want you to know I dreamed about this pie. Whenever things would get bad over there, I’d think about eating another piece of your pie and keep my head down.”

“What about thinking about us?” Lorena said.

“Sure, I did that too.” Jay winked at her. “I’d think about all those pieces of my pie you were eating.” 

“You told me to.” Lorena insisted.

“So I did, but I do have to admit I’m happy to see you aren’t fat as a pig from eating all that pie.”

“Hey.” She tried to frown, but a smile pushed it off her face. “From now on, eat your own pie.”

“That I can do.” Jay studied the pie a minute, then sliced right through the middle of it. He slid one of the halves out on his plate. “There, that’ll probably do me right now.”

When everybody laughed, Jay looked around the table. “You think I’m kidding? Well, you’re wrong.” He attacked the pie with his fork. “Umm, even better than I remembered.”

One of the first reviews for Love Comes Home from Romantic Times magazine mentioned that brown sugar pie.

“Gabhart gives readers a fantastic gift of another visit to Rosey Corner and the Merritt sisters, who are more like a real family than a family in a book. The author captures readers’ attention and absorbs them into the concerns of a town that is seeing the return of its sons after WW II. You’ll want to share the Rosey Corner series with friends and family, and this installment will leave your mouth watering for homemade brown sugar pie – and the recipe is included.”

With my editor’s urging, I did include that recipe at the end of the book. So here it is.

BROWN SUGAR PIE

• 6 tablespoons butter
• 6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1-1/2 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 cups milk
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 eggs yolks, beaten (Save whites for the meringue)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 pastry shell (9 inches), baked

In a saucepan, melt the butter. Remove from the heat; add flour and stir until smooth. Stir in brown sugar. Return to heat; stir in milk and salt until blended. Cook and stir over medium-high heat in a heavy pan or skillet until thickened and bubbly. Reduce heat; cook and stir 2 minutes longer. Remove from the heat. Stir about 2 tablespoons of the hot pie filling into the egg yolks and add mixture to the pie filling in the pan, stirring constantly. Bring to a gentle boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes longer. Remove from the heat. Gently stir in vanilla. Pour into pastry shell. Cover with meringue (recipe below).

Beat egg whites with cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar and continue to beat until stiff and glossy. Spread evenly over pie filling, sealing meringue to pie crust. Bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.

I’m not sure if any of my readers gave the pie a try, but I’ve eaten brown sugar pie that my mother made. Maybe I should make one now during this Christmas season when calories don’t count. That’s for January.

My Christmas giveaway is still going on. I picked the first week’s winner. I mailed Deborah her book yesterday. But I’ve still got two winners to pick. One this weekend and one next weekend. All you have to do to enter is leave a comment here. If you’ve already left a comment on a previous giveaway time post, you have that entry still, but you can get another one by commenting on this post too. That ups your chance of winning one of my books, and I just love reading your commentes.

You know the rules. You have to be at least 18 to enter. I’ll pick the winner by a random drawing and notify the winner by email. Deadline for the last entry is midnight EST on December 29, 2023.

All right, you know which pie is Jay’s favorite in the Rosey Corner books. So, what is your favorite pie?