A Little Taste of History

A little taste of history is what I got this week — and in the most unexpected way. Just a few days after writing about Grandma Sallie, my great-uncle Alex showed up with a few jars of canned dried apples. Right then, I told Mama we needed to make some jack pies! I had been wanting to make them ever since I wrote about Grandma Sallie, and now I finally had the chance. The timing couldn’t have been better.

The first step was making the apple filling. Dried apples are what make a jack pie unique from other pies. Long gone are the days when country folks dried their apples on pieces of tin, sometimes out in the yard, like my great-grandma did, or even up on a tin roof. That’s an old-fashioned way of doing things you don’t see much of anymore.  Nowadays, people use a dehydrator to dry their apples. The apples we used were dried with a dehydrator and canned back in 2012. Believe it or not, they were still good after all these years. According to Google, dried canned apples can last up to 30 years!

Yesterday, Mama simmered two-quart jars of canned, dried apples in a pot of water until they softened and turned a deep brown color.  When they turn that color, that’s how you know that they’re done. Then, she added sugar and a little cinnamon to taste. She let the filling sit in the fridge overnight so we could make the pies fresh the next day. 

The dark brown apple filling.

The next step is making the dough. Mama mixed up the biscuit dough while I got to help with the part I’d been most excited about — assembling the jack pies. I spooned in the filling, folded the dough over, and crimped the edges with the tines of a fork. It sounds easy, but I noticed that I was not very fast at it. I had to work quickly because the Crisco was already sizzling in the pan, waiting for the next pie to hit the grease. I couldn’t help but think about how fast Grandma Sallie must’ve been after years of making these. I’ve got some practicing to do before I can get them cranked out like she could! 

Here are a couple of my pies- not bad for my first time :)

Once the pies were crimped, they were ready for the pan. Mama fried them in Crisco until they turned crispy and golden brown. I couldn’t resist taking a bite while it was still hot—it was so good. The fried dough with the sweet, spiced apple filling was simple, comforting, and exactly how I imagined Grandma Sallie’s tasted. When Mama said they were “close to Grandma's,” that was all I needed to hear. 

Overall, I can’t describe how special it felt to make these and bring this tradition back. Grandma Sallie made hundreds of jack pies in her lifetime, but today, I got to make them for the very first time. And somehow, in the process of folding and crimping that biscuit dough, I felt a little closer to her.

Final product! They were so tasty!