Fifty Pies…

I just listened to an interview on our National Public Radio Station with a woman who had created a unique pie recipe for each of the 50 states. The book, “50 Pies for 50 States,” was written by Stacey Mei Yan Fong, an immigrant from Hong Kong who now lives in New York.

She set out to identify a pie from each state that she felt would best represent its culture, local preferences, native ingredients and other factors. She’s included the recipe for each of the 50 pies in her book.

For New Mexico, it’s the rather unappetizing looking concoction below. She calls it a “beef and pork green chile stew pie with a blue corn crust. A real simple pie on the outside with complex robust flavors on the inside.”

The ingredients that go into it look a lot better than the finished product, I think.

When I first heard about the book, I was anxious to see what pie would be picked for our state. I figured it would be an empanada, a compact traditional New Mexico pastry with fruit or meat filling, pictured below. But it turned out to be something I’d never heard of previously.

And then let’s not forget, New Mexico has what I believe to be the only village called “Pie Town,” where they actually make lots of pies and has drawn national attention for its unique name. I thought she might have worked that fact into her selection but I saw no reference to Pie Town.

I checked on the book’s pie selection for Nebraska, my wife’s home state. It is based on the popular statewide fast food “Runza.” That made a bit more sense.

If you’ve ever spent much time in Nebraska, you’ve probably heard of a Runza or seen a franchise for them. It’s a spicy ground beef, cabbage, onion and corn filled bun that originated from an old German recipe.

Runza outlets are everywhere in the state of Nebraska and are even in some areas of Western Iowa. At Nebraska home football games, promotional crews shoot Runzas into the crowd with machines normally used to blast T-shirts or hot dogs in the air.

I think it would be a lot easier to shoot an empanada into a crowd at a University of New Mexico or New Mexico State University football game than a green chile stew pie that would likely disintegrate en-route to its target. The stadium would probably smell pretty good, however.