(Un)Traditional Peach Pie

Soundtrack: Connie Converse's So Sad, So Lovely, First Aid Kit's The Lion's Roar, Cary Ann Hearst's "American Made Machine" and "Are You Ready to Die?," Joni Mitchell's "A Case of You" and "Big Yellow Taxi," Joan Baez's "Diamonds and Rust," and Mumford & Sons' "Awake My Soul."

Yesterday my friend and supervisor, Kate, came over and we made a peach pie. I anticipated it would be pretty standard, a traditional pie, sort of like the way this woman describes baking a perfect peach pie: Farmers' market peaches, lattice-top pie crust, whole wheat flour to add an "earthy note that complements the sweet peaches."

I bought seven peaches from La Casa del Pueblo, the largest grocery store near me. The recipe calls for six cups, so I thought seven would be plenty, and probably leave some over.

She came in, looking fresh and lovely, her hair pulled back in a bun, wisps of brown hair around her neck and face. Kate is natural and easy, and exudes peace and kindness. It is easy talking to her. She washed the peaches, and I peeled them. Peaches have such a special scent: They are warm and sweet--summer embodied. I love their soft skins (the ones I was slicing away with a little knife and tossing into the garbage).

All seven peaches added up to about five cups! What! We walked to the corner market, which of course didn't have peaches, so we bought a mango. As I mixed the flour, salt, and oil to make the crust that I padded down into the pie plate (rolling it out didn't work out so well), Kate mixed the peaches, mango, flour, sugar, and cinnamon together in a big red bowl. She couldn't find the lemon juice in the fridge (it was with the vinegars, oops) so she cut up and juiced a lime instead. When the delicious-smelling mix was in the pie crust, I pressed pie dough into pieces between my fingers and dappled the crust.

While it baked at 425 for forty minutes, we went outside to look at my downstairs neighbor's beehive. Kate loves bees (BEES!).

We ate our slices of pie in the little park across the street. The pie is tasty--messy, a little tropical, and sweet. The crust is savory and measures out the sweetness of the peaches and mango.