Professor Butter Beard and William Eggleston’s Peaches
“The walls were wet and sticky, and peach juice was dripping from the ceiling. James opened his mouth and caught some of it on his tongue. It tasted delicious.” - Roald Dahl, “James and the Giant Peach”
I had a crush on Mrs. Morrow. And I remember exactly when it bloomed. I was twelve and it was New Year’s Day morning. Just the day before, Mrs. Morrow’s son Mark had defiantly announced, in the back seat of our Volvo, the secret of Santa Claus (much to my horror and our mothers’ surprise). While my brother and I sat glued to the Rose Bowl Parade the next morning, the Morrows arrived for brunch. Mrs. Morrow walked by me towards the kitchen with her picnic basket and a radiant smile. The smell of her rosewater perfume mingled with another essence that swept me into an unexpected daydream of summer afternoons. I followed her into the kitchen and watched her open the basket and present a homemade peach pie and a container of freshly churned vanilla ice cream. The room began to dance. Her face pulsated with sunshine and lollipops, my soul was tiptoeing through tulips, and I was forever smitten from that moment forward.
I eventually moved on from that crush to another with the lead trumpet player in the high school band, but my passion for peaches and peach pie never diminished. In fact, when I now teach the emergence of color in my history of photography course, I always get a little hiccup in my throat as I introduce William Eggleston and his “Untitled Photograph” published in 1971.
I watch my student’s eyes travel through the ripe peaches thrown on the rusted corrugated tin roof, the turned up shoes, the use of foreshortening created by the artist’s choice of low positioning of the camera (looking up or across at ground level), and the pulsating dance of primary color and summer light. I count to five waiting for each student’s face to ultimately break into a recognizable understanding and joyful smile.
Beginning in the early 1960s, William Eggleston used color photographs to personally describe the cultural transformations in Tennessee and the rural South. He is widely credited by current art historians for with increasing recognition for color photography as a legitimate artistic medium. Eggleston's work is characterized by its ordinary subject matter. As Eudora Welty noted in her introduction to “The Democratic Forest,” an Eggleston photograph might include “old tires, Dr. Pepper machines, discarded air-conditioners, vending machines, empty and dirty Coca-Cola bottles, torn posters, power poles and power wires, street barricades, one-way signs, detour signs, No Parking signs, parking meters, and palm trees crowding the same curb.”
Dr Marcus Bunyan, writing for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, describes Eggleston’s vision as “the obvious with such candour and vigour that simple things become something more: almost interior statements of his mind evidenced in the physicality of the photograph. He may “be at war with the obvious” (as Eggleston himself claims), but these are complex thoughts told in simple, eloquent ways. They are only obvious if you know how to look for them.”
American artist Edward Ruscha said of Eggleston's work, “When you see a picture he's taken, you're stepping into some kind of jagged world that seems like Eggleston World.” For me, Eggleston captures how fleeting moments represent human presence in the world, while playing with the idea of experience and memory and our perceptions of things to make them feel personal, highly recognizable and touchingly intimate.
Almost like a peach pie. My recipe has evolved over the decades adding a bit of sweet southern crunch with the toasted pecans and the sunny surprise of ginger and rosemary. I recommend not tossing the ripe peaches with the sugars until you are ready to bake. If added too early, the sugars will draw out even more moisture from the fruit leading to an undesired “soggy bottom.” And do place the pie on a pre-heated tray in the oven. Those giant peach juices might taste delicious to both James and me, but they will smoke up your kitchen like a forest fire as they incinerate within your oven!
Thank you, Mrs. Morrow. Your smile and talents will forever shine on this journey.
Gingered Peach Pie in a Rosemary Pecan Crust
Pastry:
2 ¾ cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup roasted and cooled pecans
1 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
4 Tbsp granulated sugar
¼ tsp fine sea salt
8 ounces (2 sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
1/3 cup ice water
1 Tbsp white vinegar
Filling:
8 large peaches, sliced
1 Tbsp freshly grated ginger root
4 Tbsp all-purpose flour
½ cup granulated sugar
¼ cup dark brown sugar
½ tsp fine sea salt
2 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into 8 cubes
1 egg (for egg wash)
1) Toast the pecans in a non-stick skillet until darkened in color and aromatic. Set aside to cool completely.
2) In a food processor, combine the flour, cooled pecans, chopped rosemary, sugar and salt. Pulse a few times to chop and incorporate the pecans and rosemary. Add the butter cubes and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Add the water/vinegar and pulse until the mixture forms a dough. Divide the dough in two and chill for at least one hour.
3) Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
4) Slice the peaches (about 10 slices per peach) into a large glass bowl. Grate the ginger over the peaches and lightly toss to combine.
5) Whisk together the flour, sugars and salt and set aside.
6) Roll one portion of the dough to fit a 9” pie plate. Place in the plate leaving a 1” overhang around the edges of the plate. Place the dough-filled plate in the refrigerator.
7) Roll the second portion of the dough into the same size circle. Toss the peaches with the flour/sugar mix and spoon them into the chilled bottom crust. Top the peaches with the butter cubes. Slice the top crust into eight bars and basket weave them over the peaches. Crimp the top and bottom crusts together. Lightly egg wash the top crust and sprinkle with additional granulated sugar.
8) Bake for fifteen minutes. Reduce the heat to 375 degrees and bake for another 35-40 minutes until the crust is golden and the filling is bubbling.
