The Pie-But Maker

“You don’t make pie. You make pie-buts.” Shirley’s son Doug told her one day.

Shirley’s Butter Tarts. Photo by Kiley Melicker.

His logic was impeccable. Shirley McKee Eason made delicious pies for her family, but no matter what, she always found something wrong with them. Maybe the filling was too runny, or maybe the crust didn’t turn out quite right. She’d thoroughly analyze the pie for any failures, then bring the pie to the table and say, “Here’s the pie, but …” and then proceed to tell them what she thought was wrong with the pie.

Then of course they would all dig into the pie and enjoy it, failures and all. But, no matter, Shirley’s caveat-laced intro was so famously consistent, she ceased to be a pie-maker, and became a “pie-but” maker instead. And I find that term relatable, and absolutely hilarious.

Apparently, “pie-but” making is genetic. My friend, Wendy Eason, Shirley’s granddaughter, told me this family story and ended with a little sigh. “Actually, I also make pie-buts.”

Shirley’s Early Life

Shirley McKee grew up in Peterborough, Ontario on her family’s dairy farm, McKeedale. The farm was a family-run operation for decades, but was eventually sold in the 1990s. Wendy had the chance to stay there and visit her grandmother’s childhood home while it was still owned by the family in the 1980s.

Shirley married her husband Elwood “Craig” Eason in 1947, and relocated to the states when Wendy’s father Doug was three years old. There they raised their family of three, Barbara, Donna and Doug. Craig opened a tool shop in Fraser called “Eason Tool” and ran it for many years.

Shirley and Craig with their three children, Barbara, Donna and Doug.

When her children were grown, Shirley started work at the local high school as a secretary. She was busy with her work at the high school, but also made time to tend an impressive flower garden.

The Real Proof of the Pudding

Besides pie, the other food Wendy associated with her Grandma was the Christmas pudding Shirley would make every single year. It was a spicy, dried fruit studded pudding steamed inside of a can, that’s loaded with potatoes and carrots. It grows all the way to the brim as it steams, then gets turned out onto a large plate, covered with toffee sauce, and devoured right away.

The pudding mix gets stuffed into a can, then steamed. Pictured here pre-steaming.

To Wendy, Christmas never smells right unless Grandma Shirley’s pudding is cooking away on the stove, filling a kitchen with steam and spice. The making of the sauce is as rich in tradition as the pudding itself; she told me it’s tradition to think that the sauce just won’t get thick. Every Christmas, she remembers a female member of the family (whether it be Grandma or an emissary for grandma) standing over the stove, anxiously stirring the sauce. It’s tradition for one of them to call out to another female member of the family “I don’t think it’s thickening,” and then that person joins them at the stove and remarks something along the lines of “yeah. It’s not thickening.”

However, the sauce will always thicken; it just takes a hair longer than the stirrer expects, every time. I went through this experience as well when I recreated the recipe. I had Wendy’s familial story as my guide, so I knew that when I started to get anxious it wasn’t thickening, it was all just a part of my sauce-making journey and soon enough everything would work out.

Wendy was disappointed that after her grandmother’s passing, no one else in her family took up the torch of pudding-making, so she picked up that torch herself. She’s been making it every year for the past 5 years or so, and she recently posted pictures of it, and the original recipe, on Facebook. Scrolling through my feed one day, I saw the recipe and my “Grandma Food Alarm” went off. There were some matrilineal food mysteries afoot!

To me, there were two mysteries that needed to be solved about this pudding. First, why was this recipe Canadian? It screams BRRIIIITTISSSHHH, because British people are supposed to be the Pudding Gods. Secondly, why did potatoes and carrots find their way into an innocent steamed pudding? The addition of vegetables really works out by the end, but why did they decide to use them in the first place?

First, about the pudding seeming British: I was wrong and right at the same time (this is common for me, sigh.) I was wrong because puddings have had substantial rooting in Canada for longer than I expected, but right because this pudding IS British, but they actually credit it back to Canada. Again (so maybe I was just wrong?).

Canadians know all about pudding. Ever heard of Sticky Toffee Pudding? It’s from Canada! What a fun surprise! One of the most quintessentially British desserts was invented by Canadians, who are apparently nice enough to just let them have it. And actually, they might have a weird habit of letting England take their puddings from them…

But Shirley’s Christmas pudding, however, is no Sticky Toffee pudding. It’s actually a kind of pudding called a War and Peace Pudding, which was published and popularized by the British Ministry of Food during World War II. In this leaflet, they claim that Canadians made up this pudding during “the previous war” i.e. World War I. I haven’t found other evidence of this YET, except for the leaflet itself AND that I have a Canadian recipe for this pudding. So maybe that’s enough? Maybe Canada has just been hanging out up there, quietly inventing puddings, then sailing them over to England?

Anyhow, the fact that it’s a wartime recipe ends up answering my second question of “Why carrots and potatoes?” The British Ministry was promoting the eating of cheap produce, such as, and especially, carrots and potatoes. They shared this recipe in hopes that Brits would use it in place of the more costly ingredients of more popular pudding recipes (such as Plum Pudding). The recipe was also published as a Wartime Christmas pudding, and for many people, it’s the pudding they continue to make every Christmas.

Shirley’s “War and Peace Pudding,” or as the family would call it “Grandma’s Christmas Pudding.” Photo by Kiley Melicker.

If you have 15 minutes (and in this particular moment in time, we all do), it’s worth scrolling through this World Carrot Museum website and checking out their reprinted content of the Ministry’s carrot propaganda pamphlets. The British Ministry of Food invented the character “Dr. Carrot” and well as DOZENS of ingenious carrot recipes, including such oddballs as Carrot Fudge, Carrot Flan, and a Carrot Yorkshire Pudding (which straight up sounds like a great idea and I’m trying it immediately.)

You can learn more about this recipe (and many other puddings) from the fantastic British pudding history book Pride and Pudding by Regula Ysewjin.

And of course, for a real Canadian take on the War and Peace Pudding, give Shirley’s recipe a try.

Shirley’s pudding gets finished with a warm toffee sauce. Photo by Kiley Melicker.

The Pie-but Maker’s legacy

Shirley McKee Eason passed away on January 23rd, which happens to be National Pie Day. “If anything,” Wendy told me, “Grandma was very appropriate.”

Wendy decided to organize a pie feast for Shirley’s funeral, asking people to make pies and making many pies herself. Shirley’s friends and family gathered to feast upon pies (and assuredly a few pie-buts), and share memories of her life, her love and her food.

Shirley and granddaughter Wendy riding the Peterborough Lift Lock together.

I very much enjoyed learning about her life and recipes. They were such an adventure for me to recreate and I am honored to have family history like this shared with me. Thank you to Wendy and her family for sharing their stories and Shirley’s recipes with this project.