History of Pumpkin Pie

The history of pumpkin pie includes tales associated with European explorers, the Mayflower and abolitionists. The cultivation of pumpkins go way back to roughly 5,500 BC and was one of the first foods explorers of the New World brought back to England. Documentation of pumpkins in England began in 1536 at which time the gourd was known as “pumpions.” Now before you start picturing a pumpkin onion, that name actually came from the French word “pompon” due to its round shape.

It is likely that pumpkins were part of the meal on the very first Thanksgiving. Fast forward a few decades, various versions of pumpkin pie began taking shape. In 1653, a French cookbook detailed boiling pumpkin in milk and straining it. In 1670, English writer Hannah Woolley spoke of a pie filled with layers that alternate between pumpkin and apple. In some cases, a hollowed out pumpkin was filled with sweetened milk and spices then cooked directly over a fire – sans pie crust.

In the early 18th century, one Connecticut town was known to have postponed Thanksgiving due to a molasses shortage that made it impossible to prepare pumpkin pie (can you say #respect?). In the 1800s, abolitionist authors often wrote of Thanksgiving and pumpkin pie as a staple. So when it came time for Abraham Lincoln to proclaim Thanksgiving as a national holiday, many people in the Confederacy saw it as a “Yankee tradition.” 

Following the Civil War, pumpkin pie was alas embraced by all as Libby’s meat-canning company of Chicago launched the revolutionary canned pumpkin – taking all of the labor out of our beloved Thanksgiving treat.

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