PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — There’s a new champion. The largest Oregon-grown pumpkin pie was certified Saturday during the Giant Pumpkin Weigh Off at Bauman Farms in Gervais.
Steve Daletas trucked in his monster pumpkin, put it on the scale and took the title when the pumpkin clocked in at 2157.5 pounds, verified by the Pacific Giant Vegetable Growers Association.
The Pleasant Hill resident held the Oregon record before and earned numerous championships over the years, officials said in a release.
That’s a lot of pumpkin pies.
The history of pumpkin pies, though, is more connected with American history than you may know.
While it’s true some Pilgrims likely brought early versions of pumpkin pie recipes with them, it wasn’t until the mid-19th century “that pumpkin pie rose to political significance in the United States as it was injected into the country’s tumultuous debate over slavery. …When Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863, observers in the Confederacy saw it as a move to impose Yankee traditions on the South.”
Canned pumpkin was introduced by Libby’s in 1929.
Regardless of how you choose to make or eat your pumpkin pie, next time you should remember “the centuries of industrialists, editors, housewives, anti-slavery firebrands, culinary experimenters and Mesoamerican agriculturalists” who made pumpkin pie what it is in our society.
