Flag Pie

Once a year, for Independence Day, I make Flag Pie. The tradition began when we were having folks over for dinner and needed a desert. I had just picked some of the earliest blueberries, but there wasn't enough to make a pie or even a cobbler. But there were still local strawberries to be had! So I made a cobbler with what I had, covered it with sliced fresh strawberries, and topped it off with whipped cream - a combination of blueberry cobbler and strawberry shortcake. It was ridiculously good and given the name "Flag Pie".

The finished product. The whipped cream has been spread so it vaguely resembles a flag.


The cobbler:

Butter a 9" by 14" baking pan. Spread fresh (or frozen) wild blueberries on the bottom, about one and half berries deep. Sprinkle with about a tablespoon of flour and dot with butter.

Prepare a "cottage pudding" - a simple cake.  I use the recipe in The All New Fannie Farmer Boston Cooking School Cookbook, Tenth Edition, Completely Revised by Wilma Lord Perkins, Drawings by Alison Mason Kingsbury, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1959.

Set the oven at 400°F. Sift together:

  • 1 ½ cups flour
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • ½ cup sugar

Mix:

  • 1 egg, well beaten
  • ½ cup milk
  • ½ cup butter, melted

Stir into the flour mixture. Spread on top of the blueberries. Cook until the blueberries have started to bubble and the top is crispy and starting to brown at the edges, about 20 to 25 minutes.

The pan fresh out of the oven. Blueberry juice has bubbled up the edges and in a few places through the cake in the middle.

While it's cooking and cooling, wash, hull, and slice a container of fresh strawberries and sprinkle them with sugar. Stir now and again until the sugar is dissolved and there's lots of strawberry juice at the bottom of the bowl.

When the cobbler part is still warm (but not hot), spread the strawberries on top (about one layer) and then dribble the juice evenly across the top. Put the pan in the fridge to cool.

The cobbler covered in a layer of strawberry slices.

Whip a pint of heavy or whipping cream with a few tablespoons of sugar. Spread the whipped cream evenly across the top of the strawberries.

A slice of flag pie (a square actually) on a white plate rimmed with blue flowers. You can see the white, red, white, blue layers.

Notes:

  • If they can call it "Boston Cream Pie" I can call this "Flag Pie".
  • Yes, this is an US flag: red (strawberries), white (cake and whipped cream), and blue (the blueberries.)
  • As you may have noticed from the ingredients, this is not something to serve to people with egg, dairy, or gluten allergies.
  • I never make this unless I can get fresh local strawberries. Those giant supermarket ones don't have as much flavor. If that's all you can get, may use more of them?
  • Likewise, you can substitute those huge blueberries, but you might want to keep it to one layer since they're so much bigger than wild blueberries.
  • Most years, there aren't enough wild blueberries ripe on July 4th, so I'm sure to freeze some the summer before. Many supermarkets carry frozen ones, too. In a real pinch, you could probably use canned blueberries.
  • One year, I was a little short of blueberries, so fleshed it out with apple cut into blueberry-sized cubes. Some thought it was an improvement!
  • In the rare event that there is any left over, it's excellent for breakfast.