Page 157 - United States of Pie

Persimmon Pie

For more than sixty-five years, Mitchell, Indiana, has been the
home of the Persimmon Festival, a celebration of the indigenous
American variety of the fruit that grows wild in southern Indiana.
Every September, the town throws a party to welcome the arrival of
the persimmons, holding persimmon-centric bake-offs and cook-offs,

culminating in the Persimmon Pudding Contest.
Dymple Green, a Mitchell native, is the unofficial queen of the
festival and all things persimmon. In the late 1960s she and her
husband developed a method for commercially canning persimmon
pulp. They called the canned persimmon “Dymple’s Delight” and
shipped it throughout the United States. Though Dymple’s days as
the doyenne of canned persimmon are long behind her, she still sells

frozen persimmon pulp locally. All you need to do is knock on her
back door and ask if she has any left.
This recipe for persimmon pie has been adapted from a slim,
photocopied book that Dymple compiled over her years of working at
the Persimmon Festival. It is for a dense custard pie, similar in
appearance to a pumpkin pie, but with a taste all its own. Delicate

and sweet in flavor, the slightly gritty pulp lends the pie a pleasing
earthiness.

½ recipe Standard Pie Dough

2 large eggs
1½ cups persimmon pulp (see Note)
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup sugar