Recipes from the Past: Vinegar Pie

Have you ever thought about the food that generations past ate but that for whatever reason is absent from your dinner table?  I'm always interested in knowing why some of the dishes of our parents or even grand-parents generation no longer are fixed.  Now, I do realize that in some cases you wouldn't want them to end up on your dinner plate. My grandmother made head cheese and though I realize some people like it, I'd prefer not eat it.

One of the mailing lists I subscribe to is sponsored by the Association for the Study of Food and Society.  In one of the threads there was a mention of vinegar pie. I, like others, have not tasted vinegar pie. However, I have seen mention of it in several of my older cookbooks. I wonder why it has lost favor in the pie world?  The name may be the reason, but maybe fruit pies are just preferred in our era of access to fresh fruit all year long.

So fast forward to today when I was doing some research and saw an article by genealogist Myra Vanderpool Gormley entitled, Vinegar Pie, Cat's Eyes and Tales From Grandma's Kitchen from the Nov/Dec 2006 Ancestry Magazine.

In this article she talks about her favorite pie being vinegar pie.  She describes the ingredients as "eggs, sugar, cornstarch, apple cider vinegar, cream of tartar and vanilla extract.  Later meringue is added to the top of the filling and browned.

So have you had vinegar pie?  What does it taste like?  Do you make it still or is it simply a pie of the past in your family?