Letona's Chess Pie

• 1½ cups sugar
• 1 TBS + 1 tsp white corn meal
• ½ cup butter, melted
• 1 TBS vinegar
• ½ tsp vanilla extract
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 1 unbaked 8-inch pastry shell
1. Combine first 5 ingredients.
2. Stir in eggs. Mix thoroughly.
3. Pour into pastry shell. Bake at 350° for 50-55 minutes.

[Editor's note: I don't remember ever hearing of chess pie until we moved to Kentucky in the late 1950s. There the mother of a high school classmate served us chess pie one afternoon, and I was hooked. It's a simple pie from the "transparent pie" family, pretty much like a standard pecan pie without the pecans, but when it comes out right it's absolutely delicious. My mother, who died recently at age 80, found the recipe in Southern Living magazine around 20 years ago.]



Letona Elms