Lidia Celebrates America

This recipe was handed down from my grandmother to my mother, and then I grew up watching her make them. They would say butter the size of a walnut, a pinch of salt, the dough should be sticky and icky. (Lidia laughs) -

Lidia

Bonnie uses a basic pie dough for the crust. Her mother taught her to always roll it out clockwise. (acoustic guitar music plays) -

Bonnie

People have different techniques of doing 'em, some'll go like this. I kinda just do that. - Yeah. -

Lidia

The crumb topping, a simple mixture of butter, flour, and brown sugar, adds texture to the pie. Just like that. -

Bonnie

Now we're looking for it to get, like a little, stick together like that. -

Lidia

And then the filling. The gooey, sticky filling that the flies like so much. So here we have-- -

Bonnie

Brown sugar. Molasses. Two eggs. - Two eggs. -

Lidia

To bind it all. And that's baking soda. The brown sugar goes in first. And now we will mix this. You wanna make sure that everything is like this. -

Lidia

Smooth. Smooth, yeah, you wanna get those little bit of crumbs-- You wanna creaminess to the-- Exactly. You can buy like a black molasses. -

Lidia

What do you like? -

Bonnie

I like the syrup. -

Lidia

This is the lighter syrup -

Bonnie

Pour this in here. -

Lidia

That's it. -

Bonnie

The baking soda you can put into the water. -

Lidia

You want a hot water because you want to melt the sugar. That's correct. This is called the bottom. So you take a cup, pour it in. -

Lidia

Ah, it's beautiful. -

Bonnie

Now we're going to put the crumbs on it. You will bake this now at 350 for 50 to 55 minutes. You keep watch on it. -

Lidia

Generous portion, eh? None of that small watching my diet stuff! And I like that. Oooh. - Look at that! -

Lidia

Wow! And is this the way it looks on the side, like this? The crumbs and the-- -

Man

Gooey bottom, yeah. This is the way I remember it. With the first taste, memories came flooding back. It's so sweet with all that molasses. So delicious, toasty, and mmm. It's no wonder the flies want some too.