Teeny Lamothe has been baking her entire life, making pies from recipes handed down over generations. But when she wanted pie-baking to become a career rather than a hobby, she opted to skip pastry school and instead go for a degree in "lady bakership," complete with her own lesson plan and a one-year tour of the best woman-run pie baker shops in the country. Teeny's Tour of Pie is the result of that tour: 67 recipes plus tips on everything from mastering new skills to identifying the perfect baking shoes.
Lamothe starts with an overview of the necessary pie-baking tools and equipment before moving on to instructions--and recipes--for the perfect crusts. From there, her recipes are organized by season, drawing upon local, seasonal produce in a variety of sweet and savory pie options. Lamothe's original recipes are interspersed with some from the pie shops she visited, as well as shop profiles, tips on storing ingredients and anecdotes about the histories of various pies. From rosemary caramel apple pie to Sweet Sensations' browned butter pear pie to apple and pork potpies, each recipe is accompanied by full-color, Instagram-style photography that celebrates the beautiful imperfections of each pie. Teeny's Tour of Pie is the kind of cookbook that will be well loved and well used; Teeny herself encourages readers to "smear it with butter, dust it with flour, stain it with berry juice, and most of all, make a lot of pie." --Kerry McHugh, blogger at Entomology of a Bookworm