Custard pie
Encyclopedia
Custard
Custard is a variety of culinary preparations based on a cooked mixture of milk or cream and egg yolk. Depending on how much egg or thickener is used, custard may vary in consistency from a thin pouring sauce , to a thick pastry cream used to fill éclairs. The most common custards are used as...
mixture added to an uncooked or partially cooked crust and baked together. In North America, custard pie commonly refers to a plain mixture of milk, eggs, sugar, salt, vanilla extract and sometimes nutmeg combined with a pie crust. It is distinctly different from a cream pie
Cream pie
A cream pie is a type of pie filled with a rich custard or pudding that is made from milk, cream, flour, and eggs. It can come in many forms, including vanilla, lemon, lime, peanut butter, banana, coconut, and chocolate. A constant feature of all cream pies is the whipped cream topping...
, which contains cooked custard poured into a cooled, precooked crust. Some common custard pies include pumpkin pie
Pumpkin pie
Pumpkin pie is a traditional sweet dessert, often eaten during the fall and early winter, especially for Thanksgiving and Christmas in the United States and Canada. The pumpkin is a symbol of harvest time and featured also at Halloween....
, lemon and buttermilk chess pie
Chess pie
Chess pie is a particularly sugary dessert characteristic of Southern U.S. cuisine. According to James Beard's American Cookery chess pie was brought from England originally, and was found in New England as well as Virginia...
, and coconut custard. True custard is defined as a liquid thickened with eggs. Due to the often large number of whole eggs in custard pie it is a very rich pie.
History of custard
The Ancient Romans were the first to understand the binding properties of eggs. During the Middle AgesMiddle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, the first custard pies, as we know them, began to appear. Initially, custards were used only as fillings for pie
Pie
A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that covers or completely contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients....
s, pastries
Pastry
Pastry is the name given to various kinds of baked products made from ingredients such as flour, sugar, milk, butter, shortening, baking powder and/or eggs. Small cakes, tarts and other sweet baked products are called "pastries."...
and tart
Tart
A tart is a baked dish consisting of a filling over a pastry base with an open top not covered with pastry. The pastry is usually shortcrust pastry; the filling may be sweet or savoury, though modern tarts are usually fruit-based, sometimes with custard....
s. Both Europe and Asia had recipes that contained custards. The word custard is derived from ‘crustade’ which is a tart with a crust. After the 16th century, custards began to be used in individual dishes rather than as a filling in crusts.
In 1837, an English chemist
Chemist
A chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...
named Alfred Bird
Alfred Bird
Alfred Bird was a British food manufacturer and chemist. He was born in Nympsfield, Gloucestershire, England in 1811 was the inventor of a series of food products mostly now taken for granted...
introduced custard thickened with cornstarch. This became widely known as Bird's Custard
Bird's Custard
Bird's Custard is the original version of what is known generically as custard powder. It is a cornflour -based powder which thickens to form a custard-like sauce when mixed with milk and heated to a sufficient temperature...
, but it is not considered true custard because it is thickened with cornstarch. However, this is the main reason Bird’s custard became popular; because there were no eggs used there was no risk for the mixture curdling.
During the 19th century in North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
, custards and pudding
Pudding
Pudding most often refers to a dessert, but it can also be a savory dish.In the United States, pudding characteristically denotes a sweet milk-based dessert similar in consistency to egg-based custards, though it may also refer to other types such as bread and rice pudding.In the United Kingdom and...
s were marketed as having health benefits. Among those specifically targeted were children and mentally disabled invalids. Ingredients stated to be healthy included tapioca
Tapioca
Tapioca is a starch extracted Manihot esculenta. This species, native to the Amazon, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and most of the West Indies, is now cultivated worldwide and has many names, including cassava, manioc, aipim,...
and arrowroot
Arrowroot
Arrowroot, or obedience plant , Bermuda arrowroot, araru, ararao, is a large perennial herb found in rainforest habitats...
. By the 1930s, instant pudding and custard were widely available to North Americans.
Today, custards are used as filling in pies and tarts, and as individual dishes. Ideally a custard pie should be light and delicate, but still have good body. Custards can be made in two ways: baked or stirred upon the stove, but most custard pie recipes call for baking. The eggs in custard mixtures, when cooked, turn from liquid to solid. If cooked over excessive heat, the eggs will curdle, which is extremely undesirable. Curdling can be prevented by using lower temperatures and stirring. As such, making true custard pie is a very delicate process.
As a comedic device
- Custard pies thrown or pushed into the face are a comedic device used by clowns in many circusCircusA circus is commonly a travelling company of performers that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, unicyclists and other stunt-oriented artists...
performances. - The practice of 'flanFlanCrème caramel , flan , or caramel custard is a custard dessert with a layer of soft caramel on top, as opposed to crème brûlée, which is custard with a hard caramel top...
ning', or 'pieingPieingPieing is the act of throwing a pie at a person or persons. This can be a political action when the target is an authority figure, politician, or celebrity and can be used as a means of protesting against the target's political beliefs, or against perceived arrogance or vanity. Perpetrators...
' - throwing custard pies into the faces of public figures as a sign of disapproval - is well-known; its victims include designer Karl LagerfeldKarl LagerfeldKarl Lagerfeld is a German fashion designer, artist and photographer based in Paris. He has collaborated on a variety of fashion and art related projects, most notably as head designer and creative director for the fashion house Chanel...
, American singer Kenny RogersKenny RogersKenneth Donald "Kenny" Rogers is an American singer-songwriter, photographer, record producer, actor, and entrepreneur...
, former Dutch finance minister Gerrit ZalmGerrit ZalmGerrit Zalm is a retired Dutch politician of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy . He served as Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister from May 27, 2003 until February 22, 2007 in the Cabinets Balkenende II and III. He served earlier as Minister of Finance in the Cabinets Kok I and...
and media tycoon Rupert MurdochRupert MurdochKeith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....
. - The AmericanUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
billionaireBillionaireA billionaire, in countries that use the short scale number naming system, is a person who has a net worth of at least one billion units of a given currency, usually the United States dollar, Euro, or Pound sterling. Forbes magazine updates a complete list of U.S. dollar billionaires around the...
Bill GatesBill GatesWilliam Henry "Bill" Gates III is an American business magnate, investor, philanthropist, and author. Gates is the former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen...
was once filmed being struck in the face with a custard pie while attending a conference. The attackers, who described themselves as 'pie terrorists', were later fined. - In the movie Bugsy MaloneBugsy MaloneBugsy Malone is a 1976 musical film, very loosely based on events in New York City in the Prohibition era, specifically the exploits of gangsters like Al Capone and Bugs Moran, as dramatized in cinema...
, the "splurge guns" fire custard. - Other films notable for pie fight sequences include Laurel and HardyLaurel and HardyLaurel and Hardy were one of the most popular and critically acclaimed comedy double acts of the early Classical Hollywood era of American cinema...
's Battle of the Century, Beach PartyBeach PartyBeach Party was the first of several beach party films from American International Pictures aimed at a teen audience. It was directed by William Asher and written by Lou Rusoff. The main actors included Robert Cummings, Dorothy Malone, Frankie Avalon, and Annette Funicello...
, The Great RaceThe Great RaceThe Great Race is a 1965 slapstick comedy film starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, and Natalie Wood, directed by Blake Edwards, written by Blake Edwards and Arthur A. Ross, and with music by Henry Mancini and cinematography by Russell Harlan. The supporting cast includes Peter Falk, Keenan Wynn,...
and Smashing TimeSmashing TimeSmashing Time is a 1967 British comedy film starring Rita Tushingham and Lynn Redgrave. It is a satire on the 1960s media-influenced phenomenon of Swinging London.It was written by George Melly and directed by Desmond Davis...
. - UK Saturday morning programme TiswasTiswasTiswas was a Saturday morning children's British television series which ran from 5 January 1974 to 3 April 1982 and was produced for the ITV network by ATV Network Limited....
had custard pies as a regular feature, they even had a character called 'The phantom flan flinger' a masked man who pied people. - The World Custard Pie Throwing Championships take place annually in the village of CoxheathCoxheathCoxheath is a village and civil parish within the Borough of Maidstone, Kent, England. The parish is approximately south of Maidstone. It is mainly centred along Heath Road which links the villages of Yalding and Boughton Monchelsea to the west and east, respectively.A replica beacon pole and the...
in KentKentKent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, England.