Top 5 Best American Pies

The apple pie isn't the only classic American dessert. For those with a sweet tooth, there are plenty of options: pecans, cream, cherries, and pumpkin are some of the most popular ingredients for a tasty pie.

Top 5 Best American Pies

1. Apple pie

The most famous of all American pies is, of course, apple pie. It is made with apples spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg and lemon juice cooked inside a pastry shell, and is often served with whipped cream. There is even a town in the US named after apple pie, Pie Town in New Mexico, which has a pie festival every September. 

2. Pumpkin pie

Made with spiced pumpkin in a pastry shell, pumpkin pie is a symbol of fall and is often served at dinner on Thanksgiving Day, which is celebrated on the last Thursday in November. Unlike apple pie, pumpkin pie doesn’t normally have a top crust.

3. Pecan pie

Another popular fall pie is pecan pie, which is considered a specialty of the southern US. Its filling is made of pecan nuts, eggs, butter and sugar, and, like pumpkin pie, it doesn’t normally have a top crust.

4. Cream pie

When someone throws a pie in a comedy routine, it’s usually a cream pie. It has a filling made of milk, cream, sugar, flour and eggs, with whipped cream on top. Cream pies come in many different flavours, but banana cream pies are particularly popular.

5. Cherry pie

Cherry pie has always been a US favourite, but it was immortalised in David Lynch’s 1990s TV series Twin Peaks. In fact, Agent Dale Cooper, played by Kyle MacLachlan, was so impressed by those baked at the town’s diner that he said, “This must be where pies go when they die.”

As American as Apple Pie

If something is typically American, you can say it is “as American as apple pie.” The funny thing is, though, that the apples used in apple pie are not native to America. When European colonists began arriving in the US in the 1600s, the only apples they found growing there were crab apples, which are very small and sour. They brought their bigger, sweeter apples to the US and began growing them there – and using them to make apple pie. 

In music

The popularity of apple pie, and pie in general, in the US has inspired the title of a famous song and a famous film. The song American Pie by Don McLean was first released in 1971, on an album of the same name. It went to number one in the US, and was rerecorded by Madonna in 2000.

Modern times

American pie suggests something wholesome and domestic. But in 1999, this image was subverted by a film called American Pie. It is a comedy about five best friends, four of whom make a pact to lose their virginity before finishing high school. The film is named after the song and refers to a scene in the film in which one of the friends uses an apple pie in a sex act.