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Banana Pie
Mash or grate a banana, add yolks of three eggs, two tablespoons of sugar and thrce-fourths pint of milk in which has been dissolved a tablespoon of cornstarch. Let cook in double-boiler till thick, then place in a pastryshell just baked. Spread over the top a meringue made with the whites of the eggs and half-cup of sugar; set in the oven and let brown before serving.
A simple cornstarch-and-egg custard pie with a soft meringue. The original assumes you know how to handle a stirred custard, so the notes below fill in the numbers.
- Three-fourths pint of milkAn American pint is 16 fluid ounces, so this is 1 1/2 cups. With three yolks and a tablespoon of cornstarch it makes a fairly shallow filling for a single 8- or 9-inch shell.
- One banana is not muchTwo medium bananas, well mashed and very ripe, give more banana flavor; a single one can disappear into the custard.
- Temper the yolksWhisk the sugar and cornstarch into the cold milk first, warm it, then pour it into the yolks in a thin stream before returning everything to the double boiler. Adding yolks to hot milk directly will leave you straining out threads of cooked egg.
- How thick is thickIn a double boiler the custard will not boil, so judge by coating: it is done when it holds a line drawn across the back of the spoon, roughly 15 to 20 minutes with steady stirring. Cornstarch cooked below a simmer can taste raw and chalky, so give it the full time rather than pulling it early.
- Just baked mattersThe shell is baked empty and the filling goes in hot. A hot filling is what helps keep the meringue from weeping underneath; if the filling has cooled, warm it through before assembling.
- The meringueThree whites with a half cup of sugar is a soft, not a hard, meringue. Beat to firm peaks, adding the sugar a spoonful at a time, and spread it so it touches the crust all the way around to anchor it.
- Oven for browningThe recipe gives no temperature. A moderate oven, around 350F for 12 to 15 minutes until the peaks are tan, will do. A hotter oven browns the tips before the meringue sets and it can weep.
- ServingCool at room temperature for an hour or two, then refrigerate; the banana will darken slightly in a cut pie, so serve the day it is made.
Banana pies belong to the moment when the fruit stopped being a luxury. Through the 1870s bananas reached most American cities only occasionally and were sold singly at fairs and fruit stands; by the 1890s steam shipping and the rise of large importing companies had made them cheap and year-round, and cookbooks responded with sections devoted to the fruit, trying to find uses beyond eating them out of hand. The technique here is not banana-specific at all: it is the standard cornstarch cream-pie filling of the period, thickened with both starch and yolk in a double boiler and crowned with a soft meringue made from the leftover whites, a habit of thrift widely reflected in American pies of the era. What is notable is that the fruit is cooked into the custard rather than sliced raw into it, the arrangement most later banana cream pies would adopt.