The Darling Dahlias and the Unlucky Clover

by Susan Wittig Albert

  But that disturbing news had been balanced by something a little more comforting. Lizzy and Mr. Moseley had gone through the office accounts together, and he had decided that it wouldn’t be necessary to cut her hours.

  “At least not for the rest of this year,” Mr. Moseley had said. “To tell the truth, I don’t know how I’d get along without you, Liz. You’re an essential part of this office. I want you to know that.”

  “Thank you,” Lizzy had said gratefully. She was very glad to hear this, although after her talk with Mr. Nichols (the man from the WPA), she had received a very nice note from him, letting her know that her name was at the top of his list of people he would contact as soon as Federal Project One was funded. She would prefer to stay with Mr. Moseley, of course. But it felt good to have an alternative, if she needed it.

  “That’s wonderful news—about the Exchange, I mean,” Ophelia said excitedly. “Say, do you think I could do a story on that for the Dispatch? People will be so glad to hear that they can stop worrying about their telephone service. I could interview Mrs. Whitworth, too.”

  “Sure,” Myra May said. “That would be great, Opie.” She grinned. “I really think things are looking up for Darling, don’t you?”

  “Hey, Liz!”

  Lizzy turned at the sound of a familiar voice. It was Grady Alexander, holding up two tickets.

  “I’ve been waiting all day for a piece of that green tomato pie,” he said warmly. “How about choosing one for yourself and eating it with me?”

  Lizzy looked around doubtfully. “I’m supposed to be responsible for this table,” she said. “I don’t think I should—”

  “Oh, for pity’s sake, Liz,” Bessie said firmly. “Of course you should. There are plenty of Dahlias here to take care of things.” She put a piece of Lizzy’s pie on a plate and handed it to Grady.

  Lizzy couldn’t help feeling a little cornered. But Bessie was so insistent and Grady looked so happy that she smiled and pretended to deliberate over the pies. “I think I’ll have that one,” she said finally, pointing to Myra May’s banana cream pie.

  “Coming right up,” Bessie said, sliding a piece onto a china plate. She handed it to Lizzy but her smile was for both of them. “You two young people go and have a good time. You hear?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Grady said emphatically, and slid his arm around Lizzy’s waist. “We will do that. We will certainly do that.”

  Lizzy had to admit that his arm felt right, somehow, and to her surprise, she found herself leaning against him. Then, a little later, the Four Lucky Clovers came in for their pieces of pie and sang a final encore for their Darling friends and supporters.

  And as Grady smiled and reached for her hand under the table, Liz couldn’t help wondering whether fate or luck or fortune or perhaps even destiny was holding out another opportunity for her—another chance to choose.

  I’m looking over a four-leaf clover

  I overlooked before.

  One leaf is sunshine, the second is rain,

  Third is the roses that grow in the lane.

  No need explaining

  The one remaining is somebody I adore.

  I’m looking over a four-leaf clover

  That I overlooked before.

  THE DAHLIAS’ PIE SUPPER RECIPES

  If there were no other reason to live in the South, Southern cooking would be enough.

  Michael Andrew Grissom

  Southern by the Grace of God

  The old-fashioned pie supper is a favorite Southern tradition. In communities where money was fairly easy to come by, each pie would be auctioned off to the highest bidder in an entertaining competition. But in many communities, it was common to sell the pies by the slice, since almost everybody could afford at least one slice.

  It’s easy to find recipes for apple, cherry, and peach pie. Recipes for heritage pies are a little harder to locate. Here are five of the Dahlias’ favorites.

  AUNT HETTY LITTLE’S PECAN PIE

  The first recipe for what we know as pecan pie was published in Harper’s Bazaar, February 6, 1886, with the comment that it could be “a real state pie.” There was no clue to the state, but Alabama would have been glad to claim it. Early pecan pies were made with sorghum molasses, cane syrup, or molasses, purchased out of a barrel at the general store. The pie gained national popularity in the 1920s, when the manufacturer of Karo corn syrup (which had been around since 1902) began printing the recipe on Karo cans. There is an old Southern saying that a pie should be “sweet enough to make the fillings in your teeth ache.” The true Southern version of pecan pie certainly qualifies.

  1 unbaked 9” pastry shell

  1 cup brown sugar

  1½ cups light corn syrup, or a mix of light and dark

  4 eggs

  ¼ cup butter

  ¼ cup peach brandy

  2 teaspoons vanilla

  2 cups pecans, coarsely broken

  In a saucepan over medium heat, boil sugar and corn syrup together for 2 to 3 minutes; set aside to cool slightly. In a large bowl, beat eggs lightly. Slowly pour the syrup mixture into the eggs, continuing to beat. Stir in butter, vanilla, and pecans. Pour into crust. Bake at 350° F for 45 to 50 minutes, or until just set.

  MILDRED KILGORE’S LEMON ICEBOX PIE

  Icebox pies and other no-bake desserts became popular in the 1920s, when electric refrigeration made its way into the kitchen. (Electric refrigerators were still called “iceboxes” in the 1950s and 60s.) Lemon is only one of a dozen variations, including pineapple, lime, and orange. Crusts were often made of crushed graham cracker, vanilla wafer, or gingersnap crumbs. This filling is made with sweetened condensed milk and eggs; others were made with gelatin. Evaporated milk (also called condensed milk) was a popular product before refrigerators were common in homes; sweetened condensed milk was manufactured as early as the 1850s and was very popular.

  9” graham cracker or cookie shell

  2 14-ounce cans sweetened condensed milk

  1¼ cups fresh lemon juice

  2 tablespoons finely grated lemon zest

  8 large egg yolks

  Sweetened whipped cream for topping

  Lemon slices for garnish

  In a medium bowl, whisk the condensed milk with the lemon juice. In a separate medium bowl, beat the egg yolks and lemon zest until pale. Gradually add the condensed milk mixture, beating until smooth. Pour the filling into the shell. Bake at 325° for 25 minutes, until the edges are set and the center jiggles only slightly. Chill for at least six hours, preferably overnight. Top with sweetened whipped cream and garnish with lemon slices. For easy cutting, use a hot knife.

  VERNA TIDWELL’S SHOOFLY PIE

  While pie for breakfast was a New England tradition, folks in the rural South enjoyed it too. Food historians tell us that Shoofly Pie began as a cake and was later baked in a pie shell so it could be eaten without a plate and fork. The pie had two versions: “wet bottom” and “dry bottom.” In the dry-bottom pie, the crumb topping is mixed into the filling and baked until the filling is firm and cake-like. In the wet-bottom pie, the filling is layered on top and the bottom is gooey, like British treacle custard. Some say the name comes from the need to shoo flies off the sweet treat, but food historian William Woys Weaver speculates that it originated with a popular 1830s circus mule named Shoofly, whose name later appeared on Shoofly Molasses. It’s also possible that the word is a corruption of “soufflé,” for there is an 1837 recipe for molasses pie that is made like a soufflé, with the addition of beaten egg whites to the filling. The recipe Verna got from Bettina produces a “wet-bottom” pie.

  9” unbaked pie shell

  Crumb topping

  1½ cups flour

  ½ cup dark brown sugar

  1 teaspoon cinnamon

  ½ teaspoon nutmeg

  ⅛ teaspoon salt

  ½ cup cold unsalted butter

  Filling

  1 egg yolk

  ¾ cup molasses

  ¾
cup strong coffee

  ½ teaspoon baking soda

  Heat oven to 375°. Make the crumb topping: In a bowl, mix flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt together in a bowl. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter until the mixture looks like cornmeal. Make the filling: in a medium bowl, beat egg yolk with the molasses. In a saucepan, bring coffee to a boil and stir in baking soda. Beat hot mixture into molasses mixture and pour into pastry shell. Spoon the crumb mixture evenly over the top. Bake 15 minutes at 375°, lower temperature to 350°, and bake until set.

  MISS ROGERS’ VINEGAR PIE

  This recipe comes from the Pure Food Cook Book, compiled and published by the Women’s Progressive Farmers’ Association of Missouri in 1935. Vinegar pie was a Depression-era favorite because it required only inexpensive ingredients that were likely to be already on hand. Another version (meant to taste something like apple pie) includes familiar pie spices: cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg. Lemon, maple, and vanilla extract were also commonly used.

  1 baked 8” pie shell

  1 cup sugar

  2 eggs

  2 tablespoons cider vinegar

  1 cup water

  2 tablespoons flour or corn starch

  Sweetened whipped cream for garnish

  Mix all ingredients. Cook and stir in double boiler, then pour into baked pie shell. Chill. Garnish with sweetened whipped cream.

  LIZ LACY’S GREEN TOMATO PIE

  An early version of green tomato pie was contributed by a housewife identified only as Mrs. S. T. to the early cookbook Housekeeping in Old Virginia (1878):

  Slice green tomatoes and stew in a thick syrup of sugar and lemon juice. Grate in the yellow rind of a lemon. When transparent, spread evenly over the bottom of a pie-plate that has been lined with paste [crust]. Spread strips of pastry across or cut into ornamental leaves with a cake-cutter, place over the fruit and bake.

  During the Southern summer or whenever apples were not available, green tomatoes were a popular substitute. Here is Liz’s 1934 version of this traditional pie.

  2 9” unbaked pie crusts for top and bottom

  ¾ cup sugar

  ½ teaspoon cinnamon

  ⅛ teaspoon nutmeg

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  3 tablespoons cornstarch

  Zest of 1 lemon

  2 pounds green tomatoes, sliced ¼” thick

  ½ cup golden raisins

  2 tablespoons lemon juice

  4 tablespoons butter

  In a large bowl, mix sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, cornstarch, and lemon zest. Dredge tomato slices in the sugar mixture. Arrange in pie shell, adding raisins as you layer. Drizzle with lemon juice and dot with butter. This pie can be made with a top and bottom crust, or with a bottom crust and a lattice-work top. Bake at 400° for 25–30 minutes, until golden brown.

  RESOURCES

  Here are some resources (print and online) that I found helpful in creating The Darling Dahlias and the Unlucky Clover.

  BOOKS AND PERIODICALS

  Daily Life in the United States 1920–1940, by David E. Kyvig. How Americans lived in the Roaring Twenties and the Depression era. Helpful period background.

  Driving with the Devil: Southern Moonshine, Detroit Wheels, and the Birth of NASCAR, by Neal Thompson. Moonshine, moonshiners, and fast cars.

  The Foxfire Book: Hog Dressing, Log Cabin Building, Mountain Crafts and Foods, Planting by the Signs, Snake Lore, Hunting Tales, Faith Healing, Moonshining, and Other Affairs of Plain Living, edited by Elliott Wiggington. An oral history collection of traditional crafts.

  Month-by-Month Gardening in Alabama, by Bob Polomski. What Alabama gardeners might be doing at different seasons of the year.

  Mountain Spirits: A Chronicle of Corn Whiskey from King James’ Ulster Plantation to America’s Appalachians and the Moonshine Life, by Joseph Earl Dabney. Informative, readable history, with many anecdotes but no recipes.

  Popular Science Monthly, November 1927. The article that Deputy Springer has read is titled “Who Did the Shooting?” by Calvin H. Goddard. It begins on p. 21.

  Sears and Roebuck Spring Catalog, 1932. General merchandise catalog. What people were wearing and using during the early 1930s.

  To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. Harper Lee grew up in Monroeville (the source for her descriptions of Maycomb, where To Kill a Mockingbird is set). Monroeville is a real town, only fifteen miles from the fictional Darling.

  WEBSITES

  “Betty Crocker Radio Show: Cooking School of the Air.” https://www.otrcat.com/​p/​betty-crocker. Information on the show where Liz Lacy heard about the Chocolate Crunch cookies.

  “Federal Writers’ Project.” https://en.wikipedia.org/​wiki/​Federal_Writers%27_Project. A New Deal program designed to support out-of-work writers and document local history and culture.

  “Newspaper Archives.” http://www.newspaperarchive.com/. A subscription website that allows you to search, read, clip, save newspapers from the U.S. and around the world.

  “The Accidental Invention of the Chocolate Chip Cookie.” http://www.todayifoundout.com/​index.php/​2013/​03/​the-accidental-invention-of-the-chocolate-chip-cookie/. More about that cookie.

  DISCOVER MORE ABOUT THE DAHLIAS AND FIND A READING GROUP GUIDE

  http://www.DarlingDahlias.com

  Subscribe to Susan’s free monthly eletter, All About Thyme

  http://www.abouthyme.com/​dayletters/

  BOOKS BY SUSAN WITTIG ALBERT

  The Darling Dahlias Mysteries

  The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree

  The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies

  The Darling Dahlias and the Confederate Rose

  The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star

  The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush

  The Darling Dahlias and the Eleven O’Clock Lady

  The Darling Dahlias and the Unlucky Clover

  The China Bayles Mysteries

  The Robin Paige Victorian-Edwardian Mysteries (with Bill Albert)

  The Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter

  The General’s Women

  Loving Eleanor

  A Wilder Rose

  An Extraordinary Year of Ordinary Days

  Together, Alone: A Memoir of Marriage and Place

  Work of Her Own

  Writing from Life: Telling the Soul’s Story

  Starting Points