Southern · dessert

Chess Pie

Chess Pie reads sweetness 5.9, sourness 5.4 and richness 4.5 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a Southern dessert, about 4 hr 1 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

The measured notes (of 18)

Sweetness 5.9 · Sourness 5.4 · Richness 4.5 · Floral 3.7 · Salinity 3.6 · Warm Spice 2.2 · Nutty 2.0 · Funk & Ferment 1.9 · Umami 1.6 · Earthy 1.1 · Fruity 0.9

What's in it (11)

Time & effort: about 4 hr 1 min (1 hr 1 min active) · effort: involved

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 210.9 kcal, 3.3 g protein, 12.4 g fat, 44 g carbs

Dietary: Vegetarian · Contains dairy · Contains egg — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (7 steps)

  1. Chess pie is a larder pie: sugar, eggs, butter and a spoonful of meal, made when there was no fruit and nothing fresh in the house. That is why it is so sweet and why it exists at all. The cornmeal is the identifying ingredient — a tablespoon of it thickens the custard, gives a faintly grainy set and leaves a thin crackled sugar crust on top. Bill Neal is good on the name and honest about it: chess may be a corruption of cheese pie, or of chest pie meaning a pie that keeps in a pie chest, or of a cook's answer that it was jes pie. Nobody knows, and books that state one origin confidently are guessing.
  2. The vinegar is the other thing people query. Two tablespoons in a sweet pie sounds wrong and it is essential — it cuts a pie that is otherwise cloying and it keeps the sugar from crystallising as it sets.
  3. Whisk the sugar and the melted, cooled butter together until smooth and slightly grainy, about 2 minutes. If the butter is hot it will start to cook the eggs.
  4. Beat in the eggs one at a time, giving each about 30 seconds, until the mixture is pale and thick — about 3 minutes in all. Do not whip air into it or the top will souffle and crack badly.
  5. Whisk in the cornmeal, flour, salt and nutmeg, then the buttermilk, vinegar and vanilla, until completely smooth.
  6. Pour into the unbaked shell and bake at 175 C (350 F) for 50 minutes. It is done when the outer 5 cm is set and puffed, the very centre still shivers like loose custard, and the top has formed a thin, pale, crackly sugar crust.
  7. Cool at least 3 hours before cutting — the centre finishes setting entirely as it cools, and a warm chess pie will run across the plate. Serve it at room temperature, in small slices, with nothing on it.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.