Homemade Pie Contest @ Morton Grove Farmers' Market - 9/24

Hi all,

My friends at the Morton Grove Farmers' Market have invited me to be one of the judges at their homemade pie contest, which will be part of the market this Saturday morning. If you're an amateur pie-baking maven, you may want to consider entering the contest. All contest entries must be submitted by 10:45 am and judging will commence at 11 am. Of course, all tasting and judging will be done on a blind basis. If you're not a baker, it'd be great if you stopped by to shop the market and say hello.

For an application, more information and contest rules, please click here: Enter the MG Farmers’ Market Pie Contest!

I hope to see you on Saturday.

=R=

Morton Grove Farmers' Market
8930 Waukegan Road
Morton Grove, IL 60053

If I wasn't working that day, I would have signed up.

It was a great time this morning, even as the rain began to fall at the very end of the judging. Thanks, to GAF, for coming by, making the MG market his market of choice this morning, and saying hello.

There were 11 entries, though one was disqualified for being a cream pie; with no refrigeration available, they weren't allowed. So, we judges ended up tasting 10 pies. 9 of them were apple or apple variations. The 10th pie, a peach-honey pie, was the other entry, and I'm pretty sure that one ended up being the winner (it was pie #9 that won and I'm pretty sure that was the peach-honey). The pie I thought was the best was awarded 2nd place.

Judging was an interesting experience. Some of the pies were very good. 1 of the pies managed to still be warm when we tasted it. IMO, the best-looking pie was the worst-tasting pie. We awarded 1 to 5 points in 4 separate categories: appearance, crust flavor, filling flavor and overall flavor.

I was also impressed by the market, which my friend Brad Moldofsky, helped found. It's certainly superior to my hometown market and I can see shopping it regularly. I bought some nice produce, heard some very good live music and even got my pocket knife sharpened for $3...and tasted 10 pies! All in all, not a bad morning.

=R=

Some images from yesterday's contest, taken mostly by the lovely Mrs. Suburban . . .


Did someone say pie?



The hardware



Contestants dropping off their entries
Here, the contest administrators numbered each entry, so they could be judged blind.



Honky Tonk Parade
Up until the contest started, this outstanding band kept the crowd entertained.



Judges at work
It's a tough job but someone had to do it.



The winning pie
Entry #9. Unfortunately, right as the judging ended, the skies opened up and I went for cover, so I don't have a picture of the winning baker.

=R=

The MG FM is a nice, compact market (I usually go to Glenview or Evanston), but perhaps I will add it to my rotation. After the judges had their share, the market offered pieces to customers for a donation. I had two samples, both were worthy apple pies. It was good seeing Ronnie in his element, but he and I did get drenched.

ronnie_suburban wrote:We awarded 1 to 5 points in 4 separate categories: appearance, crust flavor, filling flavor and overall flavor.

Rules for judging are always interesting to me. Seems if you have crust flavor and filling flavor as categories, overall flavor, though not entirely redundant, is kind of unnecessary. But if it worked, it's all good.

I've been talking to chefs lately about apple pie, and one point that comes up again and again is texture. Several suggested using different types of apples to give textural variety to the filling, and of course the choice of lard/butter/Crisco (or some combo) is going to affect the texture of the crust.

HI,

For the competition rules for Greater Midwest Foodways Family Heirloom contests at State Fairs. I have included 10% for aesthetics. It is really meant to be a tie breaker.

For pies or any other food, the inclusion of overall flavor is important criteria. When SteveZ, Mike G and I judged around 40 pies, there was one pie whose overall flavor was a zero. They used a dietary sweetner whose bitterness could not overcome any good technique or filling texture. It was dreadful.

Regards,

I took the scoring in the crust and filling categories to mean more than just flavor, and considered texture and other elements when scoring the pies for those components.

=R=

I'd be remiss if I didn't add that MGFM managers Laura Frisch and Kristina Otte did a huge amount of work to make this happen. Given that it was their first "rodeo," they did magnificent job, too. From being at this event, you would have never even guessed it was their first time around.

=R=