front cover of The Norske Nook Book of Pies and Other Recipes
The Norske Nook Book of Pies and Other Recipes
Jerry Bechard and Cindee Borton-Parker
University of Wisconsin Press, 2015
The Norske Nook, founded as a small-town café in 1973, is now a foursome of revered pie shrines in Osseo, Rice Lake, Eau Claire, and Hayward, Wisconsin. The Nook’s international fame grew from a tradition of Midwest home baking, informed by Scandinavian roots and enriched by the luscious ripe fruit and sumptuous sour creams and cream cheeses of America’s dairyland.
            This cookbook features the restaurants’ award-winning baking: Scandinavian specialties, cheesecakes, tortes, cookies, muffins, and more than seventy recipes (and variations) for pie. More than fifty new pie recipes have been created by the Nook bakers since 1990, when Jerry Bechard purchased the Osseo café from founder Helen Myhre. The Norske Nook has won thirty-six blue ribbons at the National Pie Championships in Florida—including three in 2014, for Lemon Cream Cheese, Peaches and Cream, and Jamberry.

Gold Medal Winner, Cookbook, Foreword Reviews IndieFab Book of the Year Awards 

Runner-up, Cookbooks/Crafts/Hobbies, Midwest Book Awards

“Outstanding” books for public & secondary school libraries from university presses, American Library Association

“Best of the Best” books for public libraries from university presses, American Library Association
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front cover of Pie
Pie
A Global History
Janet Clarkson
Reaktion Books, 2009

Apple pie. Pumpkin pie. Shepherd’s pie. Chicken potpie. Sweet or savory, pies are beloved; everyone has a favorite. Yet despite its widespread appeal there has never been a book devoted to this humble dish—until now.

            Janet Clarkson in Pie illustrates how what was once a purely pragmatic dish of thick layers of dough has grown into an esteemed creation of culinary art. There is as much debate about how to perfect the ideal, flaky pastry crust as there is about the very definition of a pie: Must it have a top and bottom crust? Is a pasty a pie? In flavorful detail, Clarkson celebrates the pie in all its variations. She touches pon the pie’s commercial applications, nutritional value, and cultural significance; and she examines its international variations, from Britain’s pork pie and Australia and New Zealand’s endless varieties of meat pie to the Russian kurnik and good old-fashioned American apple pie.

            This delectable salute to the many pies enjoyed the world over will satisfy the appetites of all readers hungry for culinary history and curious about the many varieties of this delightful food, and it just might inspire them to don aprons and head for the stove.

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