Paul has a Masters of Music in jazz guitar from the Manhattan School of Music and a Bachelors of Music with honors from the New England Conservatory.  He teaches jazz guitar and coaches ensembles at William Paterson University and at New Jersey City University, both in New Jersey, and he gives private lessons.

He performs regularly in the New York TriState area.  One of my favorite places to hear him used to be the charming and late-lamented Le Madeleine restaurant on 43^rd Street in Manhattan, where he would often sub for his mentor Gene Bertoncini, another amazing guitarist.

One of Paul’s passions is Brazilian jazz.  He was a member of the Terra Brasil, which featured pianist/composer Cidinho Teixeira and vocalist Vera Mara, both veterans of the great Gilberto Gil’s band. He later co-led Brasil & Company with Ms. Mara, and they released a highly regarded CD as well.  He recently returned to Tokyo to play the Blue Note with vocalist Karrin Allison, performing music from her new Brazilian CD Imagina.

For a delightful sample of Paul’s playing check out this YouTube recording.  I remember showing up for my lesson one day and hearing Paul talk about the jazz version of the Beatles’ “Norwegian Wood” that he was working on.  Here it is!

I asked Paul for some words of wisdom about the creative process and this is what he said: 

“If you feel a connection to the guitar and music, you’re on the journey. Every step starts by picking up the guitar and exploring a little further or deeper. It never ends. Enjoy the journey and enjoy the point you’re at in it. When you play (not practice) you pull together and shape what you know into a story. When you practice you examine and shape all the elements you have for telling the stories. When you’re trying to go deeper into the guitar, pick it up.  It will teach you as you play it.  It becomes a dance between what you know and what’s possible on the fretboard.”

This is great advice for everyone involved in the creative process, no matter what the medium.  It’s always a journey in which the next step is only revealed after the previous step has been taken.

And here’s what jazz legend Andy Bey says about Paul’s version of that journey: 

“First of all, Paul Meyers is a brilliant musician, but most of all he has a broad musical concept. He has such great sensitivity where you can feel the music coming out of his guitar and not just hear the notes. I know this will continue to serve him well, always.”

Visit Paul’s website for more information, photos, and some more great music.

Jonathan has been a blues guy for forty years.  He’s been on the same bill with blues greats like B.B. King, Luther Allison, Dr. John, Mike Bloomfield, and Johnny Copeland—and he’s worked with Steve Miller, Otis Rush, Lightning Hopkins, Bo Diddley, Solomon Burke, Sunnyland Slim, Evelyn Champagne King, Tracy Nelson, Honeyboy Edwards, and Gary U.S. Bonds. 

He’s got a Jimi Hendrix connection too—Jimi’s signature fuzz-tone sound was inspired by hearing Jonathan play.  Jimi admitted it.  At the age of nineteen Jonathan was the musical director for The Fugs.  They played in the Village, next door to the Café Wha where Jimi got his start—so the stage was set for cross-fertilization.

Jonathan plays regularly at venues in the New York/TriState area.  I made a pilgrimage to Roosevelt Island a few weeks ago, where he was performing solo on the patio of the Trellis Restaurant.  Summer in the city isn’t pleasant, but a sizeable audience had gathered to be distracted from the heat by Jonathan’s cool renderings of blues (and jazz) standards.

He also performs at blues festivals, most recently in South Carolina—and he tours frequently in Europe.  Last fall took him to the UK for the twelfth time, with a side trip to Norway.

Jonathan is also a great teacher.  I should know–I’ve studied guitar with him since 2002.  His lessons are a cool mix of theory and demonstration, plus a good dose of jamming.  What a thrill to jam with a master! 

Here’s an excerpt from a review that appeared in the magazine Blues in Britain:

“WOW!… That’s all I have to say about Jonathan Kalb … this guy is the real deal, that indefinable sound, phrasing, confidence and just all around X factor that makes the greats stand out from others. Few have it, Jon is one of those few. As he played a borrowed Fender, pickless, I could not help thinking of an early Stevie Ray Vaughan. Bending, vibrating and manipulating the guitar to produce a sound of his own. Vocally, Jon is very powerful, but subtle too, with perfect phrasing. The overall sound produces excitement and makes for an intoxicating cocktail for the audience to enjoy… You must hear him live.” — Captain Pat  

I asked  Jonathan for some words of wisdom and here’s what he said: “Success has to do with how much desire you have and how committed you are to what’s in your heart—it’s 20% talent and 80% hard work, passion, and tenacity.”  Great advice for anyone!

Visit Jonathan’s website at www.JonathanKalb.org for much more information about this very cool bluesman—including some great videos of his live performances.

In 2006 they earned a spot in the MTA’s Music Under New York program out of a field of more than 400 applicants. MUNY continues to provide them with sanctioned performance locations within the subway system. Busking isn’t for the faint of heart though. I caught their act under Herald Square a few weeks ago, watching as the Peruvian pan pipes guys who had the spot before them packed up, then watching—with a certain amount of apprehension—as Heth and Jed eyed a couple of sinister-looking dudes lurking nearby. Apparently the New York underground can be a very territorial place and, despite the MTA’s sanction, Heth and Jed have had to fight for their spot on occasion.

Their sound is like nothing you’ve ever heard before. What you see is a guitar and bass. What you hear—what they call their “Jambient sound”—uses live looping and an array of effects to explore sonic textures never before heard in the streets or subways of New York City.

Recently Gothamist.com asked them to write about their exploits in a feature called “Tourist” (a tour diary). As a result of that article, the duo has just signed a contract with Soft Skull Press for Buskers: The on the Streets, in the Trains, off the Grid Memoir of Two New York City Street Musicians. So now they’re writers too!

There’s lots more, including videos, on their website. And if you live in the NYC area, check out their performance schedule there too.

I asked Heth and Jed for some words of wisdom to pass along and here’s what Heth told me:

“In terms of inspiration, Jed and I feel most alive when we are sharing our music with the community. The mere presence of art in public areas changes the temperature of the room. The connection to audience (our neighbors) is what inspires us.”

Steve is a New York City guitar guy with an impressive resume: he’s got a BA in composition from the Berklee College of Music and has worked with artists as varied as Bo Diddley, John Sebastian, Chico Hamilton, Carl Wilson, Robert Lamm, the Mamas and the Papas, Little Anthony and the Imperials, Nora York, and the Joffrey Ballet. His Broadway credits include Rent, Tick Tick Boom, Johnny Guitar, They Wrote That, People Be Heard, and Up in the Air.

His current band is an instrumental trio with Steve on guitar, of course. They gig around New York City and have just completed their second CD.   Steve was a founding member of Nine Below Zero, known to many blues enthusiasts in the eighties and nineties, and he lent his guitar skills more recently to Bucktooth Johnson, which I listened to with delight many times at Scotland Yard in Hoboken.

For the past few years he’s had an ongoing collaboration with singer-songwriter Hope Nunnery, who creates beautiful tunes that evoke gospel and Appalachian folk songs.  Their collaboration resulted in a stunning album called Wilderness Lounge, and they’re at work on a second album.

Steve’s also currently working with composer Jamie Lawrence–playing guitar on a documentary film about Sean Penn’s work in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina. 

Steve’s the author of over fifteen books published by the likes of Music Sales Inc. and Hal Leonard, and till its recent closing he was a multi-faceted teacher at the New School’s Guitar Study Center.  I first met him there when I signed up for the wonderful Blues Ensemble course. Steve’s been giving private lessons for over twenty years, and his website gives a terrific glimpse of the wide variety of students who study with him.

I asked Steve what he’d advise people pursuing creative goals of all kinds, and here’s what he said:

Number one: just do the work and don’t worry so much about the result. It’s a cliché, but the hardest steps are the first ones. Don’t wait around for permission to do it, or until you think you are “good” enough. Just start and see what happens.

Number two: Role model the things you like. Borrow, copy, steal. All the greats have. Inevitably your own voice will shine through anyway. In my mind “art” is more cultural than individual. Think of yourself as part of the great universe of creativity, instead of a lone voice. Be part of the culture. You don’t have to invent it.

Number three: Don’t take anyone else’s rules and numbers and advice too seriously. It may help you—or not!

Visit Steve’s website for lots more information about his projects, as well as video and audio links.  You can buy copies of his CDs there too!

Rum was a by-product of the sugar-making process, and I knew this pie had to have rum. Who can think of the islands without thinking of coconuts? But most recipes for coconut cream pie omit that crucial ingredient.

I finally found what I was looking for in a Caribbean cookbook I bought long ago at a flea market. It’s from the Time-Life series, a wonderful cookbook series dating from decades ago, when travel and exotic menus weren’t such an easy part of our lives as they are now. Nearly every cuisine you can name is represented in the series, and each gets two books—a big hardcover with pictures of food and festivals, plus recipes, and a small spiral-bound booklet with even more recipes.

I have quite a collection of these cookbooks, assembled from garage sales, flea markets, and used-book stores. Usually I find either the big hardcover or the small booklet first, then have the thrill of finding the missing half of the set at some whole other venue.

Anyway, the Time-Life version of the pie is very labor-intensive, so I invented a variation that uses the same flavorings—dark rum, nutmeg, and vanilla—but substitutes boxed pudding mix.

The crust is a variation on one we’ve used before—very flaky and rich with butter AND lard.

Crust:

1-1/2 cups flour
6 tablespoons butter, very cold, cut into small pieces
2 tablespoons lard, very cold, cut into small pieces
1 tablespoon sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
4 to 6 tablespoons ice water

Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl and add the butter and lard. Use two knives scissor fashion or your fingers to mix the flour mixture and the shortening together till the result looks like coarse meal.

Add 4 tablespoons of ice water, one at a time, tossing the mixture with a fork till it clings together. Add more ice water if necessary. Flour your hands and gather the mixture into a ball, wrap it in plastic wrap, and refrigerate it for ½ hour or more.

When you are ready to roll it out, flour your rolling surface and rolling pin. Pat the dough gently into a circle an inch thick or even thinner—this makes it easier to keep a circular shape when you begin to roll. Make sure to use plenty of flour and rotate the dough from time to time, sprinkling more flour underneath to make sure it doesn’t stick to your rolling surface.

When you’ve shaped it roughly into a circle large enough for your pie pan, fold it into quarters and gently transfer it to the pan, unfolding it and smoothing it to fit. Trim the edges, if necessary, so you have only an extra half inch all around. Now tuck the overhanging crust under. To make a fancy edge like in the picture, place the index and middle finger of one hand on the edge pointing out and with half an inch between them. Use the thumb of the other hand to push a little ridge into the dough, working your way all around the edge of the pie doing the same thing.  Prick the bottom and sides of the crust with a fork.

Bake the empty crust at 400 degrees for 10 minutes, then check on it and pat the dough down if it’s starting to puff up. Bake it for an additional 10 minutes or more. It should be starting to turn slightly brown when you take it out. (You’ll be baking the pie again to brown the meringue so you don’t want the edges of the crust to get too brown now.)

Let it cool while you make the filling.

Filling:

1 box Jell-O “cook & serve” vanilla pudding and pie filling—not instant
2 cups milk
1 cup “sweetened flake coconut”—from the aisle of the grocery store where you find flour and other baking supplies
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons dark rum
½ teaspoon nutmeg

Bring the milk and pudding mix to a full boil, stirring all the while. Turn off the heat and add the coconut and other ingredients. Let the pudding mixture cool on top of the stove while you make the meringue.  Stir the mixture occasionally. 

Meringue Topping:

4 egg whites
6 tablespoons sugar
½ teaspoon cream of tartar

Beat the egg whites and cream of tartar until the egg whites are frothy, then slowly add the sugar, beating all the while. After a minute or two, the egg whites should become quite stiff. Continue beating until stiff peaks remain if you remove the beaters.

Meringue can be tricky. To make sure you aren’t beating a soupy mess forever instead of getting the result you want, make sure the beaters are perfectly clean and there are no specks of egg yolk or shell in your egg whites before you start. You can scoop extraneous objects out with a spoon. 

Turn the pudding mixture into the pie shell.  Spread the meringue over the top.  Make sure the meringue touches the inner edge of the crust–it has a tendency to shrink while it bakes and this will keep you from having bare spots around the edges of your pie. 

Bake the pie at 350 degrees for 15 minutes or until the meringue turns a delicate brown.  Let the pie cool a bit and then refrigerate it.  Serve it cold, and refrigerate the leftovers.

A slice of Strawberry Fields Pie

“Strawberry Fields Forever” isn’t the blusiest of tunes, though the Beatles certainly owe a debt to the blues tradition. But please indulge me . . .

These early summer days are perfect strawberry weather, and for me strawberries always evoke those moments when time stands still and life seems unbearably sweet. There were more of them in the sixties than there have been lately, and music was always a part of them. How appropriate that the John Lennon memorial in Central Park is Strawberry Fields.

I’ve been making this pie since I was in high school. One of my friends taught me how, and when I make it I still pull out the postcard she sent me in 1965 when I wrote to her from college asking her to remind me of the details.

The beautiful thing about this pie is that the strawberries don’t end up being cooked, so they taste as sweet and fresh as if you were picking them yourself and eating them as you went along.

Prepare the crust well in advance so it’s cool by the time you add the filling.

Crust:

1-1/4 cup sifted flour

1/3 + 1 heaping tablespoon shortening

1/2 teaspoon + 1 pinch salt

1/6 cup cold water + extra

Sift the dry ingredients together, then cut the shortening in using two knives scissors style. The shortening shouldn’t be completely blended or the crust will be tough. You want bits of shortening, no larger than lentils, to remain because they melt as the crust bakes and make the crust flaky.

Next, sprinkle the water over the flour, salt, shortening mixture and use a fork to toss and blend. Use more water if necessary, but only a little bit at a time. The dough should be moist enough to adhere together in a ball, but not sticky. Form the dough into a flat patty, using plenty of flour on your hands, then roll it out. Use plenty of flour on your rolling surface and rolling pin too. Turn the dough frequently as you roll it out, and sprinkle with more flour, so it doesn’t stick to the rolling surface.

When you’ve shaped it roughly into a circle large enough for your pie pan, fold it into quarters and gently transfer it to the pan, unfolding it and smoothing it to fit. Trim the edges, if necessary, so you have only an extra half inch all around. Now tuck the overhanging crust under. To make a fancy edge like in the picture, place the index and middle finger of one hand on the edge pointing out and with half an inch between them. Use the thumb of the other hand to push a little ridge into the dough, working your way all around the edge of the pie doing the same thing.

Prick the bottom and sides of the crust and bake it at 450 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes or until it turns a nice golden color.

Filling:

1 box strawberry jello

1 ¾ cups cold water

2 tablespoons cornstarch

1 teaspoon vanilla

16 oz. fresh strawberries = 1 pint

Whipping cream

Wash the strawberries, remove the stems, and slice the berries. If they are really huge, as strawberries tend to be these days, cut them in half lengthwise before you slice them.

Bring the jello, water, cornstarch, and vanilla to a boil, then take it off the heat and let it cool to room temperature. If you’re in a hurry, you can refrigerate it, but don’t let it set up. Add the strawberries and pour the jello-berry mixture into the cooled pie shell.

Chill the pie till the jello is firm—two hours is usually enough.

Serve the pie topped with sweetened whipped cream.

Next month: Coconut Cream Pie

Like Led Zeppelin, I added something to the mix. In my case, it’s rhubarb. And the custard effect results from the combination of eggs, sugar, and rhubarb juices, rather than from eggs and milk.

When my husband was growing up, his family had a rhubarb plant in their yard, and one of his earliest cooking experiments was rhubarb pie. Now rhubarb is hard to find. We’ve tried several times to grow it but it doesn’t thrive in a yard overshadowed by huge trees.

Most grocery stores ignore it these days. Who’d want rhubarb when you can buy any fruit or vegetable you want all year round? In earlier times, rhubarb would have been appreciated as one of the first fresh growing things available in the spring.

I tracked mine down at the fancy Whole Foods store, an hour round trip for me because of New Jersey traffic, and $5.95 a pound!

Crust:

It’s the standard crust we’ve used before so I’m recycling the instructions from earlier pies:

1 cup sifted flour

1/3 cup shortening

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/6 cup cold water

OR

1-1/4 cup sifted flour

1/3 + 1 heaping tablespoon shortening

1/2 teaspoon + 1 pinch salt

1/6 cup cold water + extra

I’ve discovered that increasing the ingredients slightly makes it easier to roll out a nice piece of dough that fits the pan with no thin spots around the edges.

Sift the dry ingredients together, then cut the shortening in using two knives scissors style. The shortening shouldn’t be completely blended or the crust will be tough. You want bits of shortening, no larger than lentils, to remain because they melt as the crust bakes and make the crust flaky.

Next, sprinkle the water over the flour, salt, shortening mixture and use a fork to toss and blend. Use more water if necessary, but only a little bit at a time. The dough should be moist enough to adhere together in a ball, but not sticky. Form the dough into a flat patty, using plenty of flour on your hands, then roll it out. Use plenty of flour on your rolling surface and rolling pin too. Turn the dough frequently as you roll it out, and sprinkle it with more flour, so it doesn’t stick to the rolling surface.

When you’ve shaped it roughly into a circle large enough for your pie pan, fold it into quarters and gently transfer it to the pan, unfolding it and smoothing it to fit. Trim the edges, if necessary, so you have only an extra half inch all around. Now tuck the overhanging crust under. To make a fancy edge like in the picture, place the index and middle finger of one hand on the edge pointing out and with half an inch between them. Use the thumb of the other hand to push a little ridge into the dough, working your way all around the edge of the pie doing the same thing.

If you want to speed things up, you can use a prepared crust. I’ve discovered that the frozen crusts that come in their own little aluminum pie pans work very well. They are surprisingly flaky, and the only giveaway that they are not home-made is that the decorative edge is a bit too regular. I’ve also tried the prepared crusts that are sold in the refrigerator case, already shaped to go into your own pie pan and then curled up into long rolls that you unroll. Those are not so good.

Filling:

3 beaten eggs

1 ½ cups of sugar

¼ teaspoon of nutmeg

A pinch of salt

4 cups of rhubarb, cut into half-inch chunks

Mix the filling well and spoon it into the prepared crust, smoothing it out evenly. Bake the pie at 400 degrees for 45 minutes or until the crust is nicely browned and the custard isn’t runny.

It’s great with vanilla ice cream.

Next month: My childhood strawberry pie

The cloth is from a huge open-air market in Accra.

I picked this pie for March with a nod to St. Patrick’s Day because when we think of limes, we think–GREEN.

Except key limes are yellow and that’s part of the story behind Key Lime Pie. It’s an American classic, and like many great recipes is a result of making do with the ingredients at hand. Key limes are unpromising little things, smaller than golf balls, and probably introduced to the Florida Keys when the Spanish came in the 1500s. Sweetened condensed milk is used because before the 1930s, the Keys had no fresh milk, no refrigeration, and no ice. Canned sweetened condensed milk had been around since 1856 and was a great boon to dessert-lovers.

“Key to the Highway” is a great blues song. I doubt whether the highway to the Keys is the one the song’s creators had in mind, but that road does lead south–about as far south as one can go in the US.

Crust:

1 ¼ cups graham cracker crumbs = 9 whole (rectangular) crackers

¼ cup sugar

¼ cup butter

Mix the crumbs, butter, and sugar with your fingers till it’s all very well blended and looks like damp sand. Press it into your pie pan, working it up the sides with your fingers or the back of a spoon. Use your thumb to make a smooth edge at the top. Bake it for 10 minutes at 375 degrees. Let it cool while you make the filling. Turn the oven down to 350 degrees.

You can use a grocery-store graham cracker crust instead—you’ll find them in the aisle with boxed cake mixes.

Filling:

5 egg yolks

1 cup sweetened condensed milk

½ cup lime juice = 4 medium limes

1 teaspoon grated lime rind = 2 limes

Grate the rind before you cut the limes in half to squeeze them. It’s much easier to keep a good grip on a whole lime. Beat the egg yolks till they are light yellow. Add the other ingredients slowly and beat on lower speed just to mix. Pour the mixture into the crust and bake for 15 to 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Let it cool while you make the topping. Turn the oven up to 425 degrees.

Meringue topping:

5 egg whites

1 cup sugar

½ teaspoon cream of tartar

Beat the egg whites till they are frothy. Add the sugar and cream of tartar a little at a time, continuing to beat till the whites are very stiff.

Meringue can be a challenge to make. Be sure that your bowl and beaters are perfectly clean and that your egg whites are room temperature. If there are any specks of yolk or shell in the whites, it will be hard to get them stiff and you might have to beat them a very long time. You can pick yolk and shell out with a spoon or the corner of a paper towel.

Cover the pie with the meringue, making sure that it comes all the way to the edges. Otherwise it will shrink while cooking and you will have bare spots. Bake the pie at 425 degrees for 5 to 15 minutes or until the meringue is lightly browned. Oven temperatures vary greatly so keep your eye on things to monitor how brown the pie is getting.

Chill the pie before serving.

Next month: Custard Pie

Can she bake a cherry pie?

Cherry Pie is traditional for February because of Washington’s Birthday, but this month’s pie was inspired by Miles Davis too.

The ancient children’s song, “Billy Boy,” includes a verse that starts with the line, “Can she bake a cherry pie, Billy Boy Billy Boy . . .” (Here’s a link for the song.)  

What’s the Miles Davis connection? Milestones, the 1958 album from Miles’s bebop period, includes an instrumental version of the tune—such a tribute to the playfulness and inventiveness of that art form, to start with a children’s song and improvise it into one of the most out-there tunes ever recorded.

Now . . . a note on the pie itself:

I found the recipe for this crust in an out-of-the-way cookbook. You’ll notice that the proportion of shortening (vegetable shortening and butter) to flour is much greater than the proportion in conventional pie crust. This makes the crust hard to handle, and I ended up with a pie that is not as photogenic as some of my previous ones.

In fact I was going to start over with a new batch of filling and a crust made with the standard two-thirds cup shortening to two cups flour, but my husband and I each had a piece of the pie for dessert. We continued to nibble to the point that I was afraid there would be no pie left to photograph unless I grabbed the camera fast, so I decided to use this crust. It may not be very photogenic, but it is incredibly rich and flaky. 

Crust:

3 cups flour

½ teaspoon salt

¾ cup vegetable shortening

¾ cup butter, in little pieces

cold water

Sift the flour and salt together into a medium-sized bowl. Cut the shortening and butter in with two knives, scissor fashion, or use a food processor with the normal blades. If you’re using a food processor, return the mixture to the bowl afterwards.

Now add cold water a tablespoon at a time, tossing the mixture with a fork till it starts to cling together. You might need anywhere from three to six tablespoons of water, or more, but don’t add more till you’re sure you need it. You don’t want your dough to become gummy—you just want it to cling together so you can form it into a ball.

With floured hands, knead the dough together but don’t handle it too much. Divide it into two portions, one a bit bigger than the other, and pat them into flat rounds. If you have time, chill them for twenty minutes or so before you try to roll them out.

All the shortening in this recipe makes the dough very fragile and chilling it helps it hold together. Whether you chill or not, you’ll find that you end up with a crust that’s a bit thicker than with a normal pie crust because it’s very hard to roll this rich dough thin without having it fall apart.

Roll out the larger piece of dough and use it to line your pie pan, patting it into place. Trim the edges so you have a half-inch overhang. Add the cherry filling.

Filling:

3 15-ounce cans pitted dark sweet cherries in heavy syrup, drained

¼ cup sugar

2 tablespoons cornstarch

½ teaspoon cinnamon

½ teaspoon nutmeg

Mix together gently before spooning into the bottom crust.

Roll out the smaller piece of dough and lay it over the top of the pie. Trim the edges to match the bottom crust. Press the top and bottom crusts together and tuck the overhanging crust under all the way around.

To make a fancy edge like in the picture, place the index and middle finger of your left hand on the edge pointing out and with half an inch between them. Use the thumb of your right hand to push a little ridge into the dough, working your way all around the edge of the pie doing the same thing. You’ll have better luck getting a nice edge to form if you have chilled your dough before working with it.

Bake the pie at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes or until the crust is golden and looks thoroughly done.

Vanilla ice cream probably isn’t necessary but it’s a great addition.

Coming next month: Key to the Highway Lime Pie

I used the lighter-colored sweet potatoes.

Sweet Potato Pie is reportedly our president’s favorite pie, and it’s one of my favorites too.

I first tasted it during the student protests at San Francisco State University when I was a student there in the Sixties. Students were boycotting classes, spending their days marching with picket signs. One day a group of African-American students showed up with a gift of sweet potato turnovers—easier to eat while marching than an actual piece of pie. Those were heady times, and knowing black people as friends was an exotic experience for someone with my sheltered middle-class background. Now with our new president we see a wonderful fruition of Sixties ideals.

Recipes for Sweet Potato Pie often say to use sweet potatoes or yams. But a true yam would be hard to come by in the U.S. The yam is an African staple, totally unrelated to the sweet potato, which is a New World plant.

When I was in Ghana studying percussion some years ago, I had the wonderful experience of watching people from the village plant a yam field, complete with work songs. The yam is such an important foodstuff in some parts of Africa that whole festivals revolve around it.

The U.S. has two varieties of sweet potato, however, one of which more closely resembles certain varieties of the African yam. The lighter-colored sweet potato is just that—a sweet potato, with a starchy potato-like texture. But there’s an orange-brown sweet potato with a moister texture and a sweeter taste. It’s often (mistakenly) referred to as a yam.

Sweet Potato Pie is such a staple of soul food that it’s tempting to suppose Africans transplanted to the U.S. recognized in the sweet potato a vegetable analogous to the yams they had known at home.

Crust:

This is the same crust that we’ve used for some of the other pies.

1 cup sifted flour
1/3 cup shortening
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/6 cup cold water

OR

1-1/4 cup sifted flour
1/3 + 1 heaping tablespoon shortening
1/2 teaspoon + 1 pinch salt
1/6 cup cold water + extra

I’ve discovered that increasing the ingredients slightly makes it easier to roll out a nice piece of dough that fits the pan with no thin spots around the edges.

Sift the dry ingredients together, then cut the shortening in using two knives scissors style. The shortening shouldn’t be completely blended or the crust will be tough. You want bits of shortening, no larger than lentils, to remain because they melt as the crust bakes and make the crust flaky.

Next, sprinkle the water over the flour, salt, shortening mixture and use a fork to toss and blend. Use more water if necessary, but only a little bit at a time. The dough should be moist enough to adhere together in a ball, but not sticky. Form the dough into a flat patty, using plenty of flour on your hands, then roll it out. Use plenty of flour on your rolling surface and rolling pin too. Turn the dough frequently as you roll it out, and sprinkle with more flour, so it doesn’t stick to the rolling surface.

When you’ve shaped it roughly into a circle large enough for your pie pan, fold it into quarters and gently transfer it to the pan, unfolding it and smoothing it to fit. Trim the edges, if necessary, so you have only an extra half inch all around. Now tuck the overhanging crust under. To make a fancy edge like in the picture, place the index and middle finger of one hand on the edge pointing out and with half an inch between them. Use the thumb of the other hand to push a little ridge into the dough, working your way all around the edge of the pie doing the same thing.

And remember that the frozen crusts that come in their own aluminum pans work fine.

Filling:

2 cups cooked sweet potatoes or “yams”
1/2 cup melted butter
2 eggs, separated
1 1/4 cup sugar—but I’ve seen versions that use as little as ½ cup
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ginger
3/4 cup sour cream

When I make this pie, I cook the sweet potatoes by baking rather than boiling. They can end up with too much moisture in them if you boil them and then your pie won’t set up nicely. I start with two large sweet potatoes and have more than enough. The amount of time you bake them depends on the size, but allow at least an hour at 400 degrees—be sure to poke the tops in several places with a fork or sharp knife. Otherwise they will explode in the oven and you’ll have a huge mess. Don’t poke the bottoms though or sweet juice will leak out and burn in your oven, also making a huge mess.

Scrape the cooked potato out of the shells, measure out 2 cups, and mash it thoroughly. Combine it with the butter, egg yolks, 1 cup of the sugar, the salt and spices, and the sour cream, blending very well. I use my electric mixer for this step.

Beat the egg whites slightly, add the remaining 1/4 cup sugar, and continue beating till they are stiff. Fold them into the sweet potato combination and pour it all into your unbaked pie shell. Bake 10 minutes at 400 degrees, then reduce the heat to 350 degrees and bake 30 more minutes, or until the edge is nicely browned but not burned and the filling does not wobble. You can also pat the top to make sure the filling has set up.

I serve it with slightly sweetened whipped cream.

Next month: A cherry pie inspired by a Miles Davis tune, and maybe George Washington too.