If you’ve been to the Del Ray Farmers’ Market, you have probably seen the Extraordinary Pie Gal stand.
This month, owner Morgan Dodd is celebrating her business’s one-year anniversary.
All of Dodd’s creations are handmade, and many of the fillings are made from fresh ingredients she picks up from area farmers' markets. She even makes vegan pie crusts.
Dodd started her company a year ago after realizing she needed a passion project outside of work. Cooking has always been a favorite activity of hers.
“I’ve just always had this love for making people feel good with my food,” Dodd said.
Growing up, her family was always cooking with fresh food they had grown in their own yard and pies played a significant role in her childhood.
“We used to always stop on Sunday mornings and get the Sara Lee pies,” Dodd said. “And there wasn’t anything black owned, and that kind of pushed me into doing it as well.”
Dodd’s family has pie recipes they have passed on through generation, and she was rarely seeing anyone who was only dedicating themselves to pie.
“Pies are like these beautiful creations; you can literally take the crust and make it into your own. If you want to do fall leaves, you can do fall leaves. If you want to do gingerbread men, you can do gingerbread men.”
Even though she had deep connections to pie, she still had to overcome the daunting challenge everyone who makes pies faces – the crust.
“When I first started, I was discouraged making the crust, because it is so difficult to make,” Dodd said. “I think over time the more you work at something the better you get at it.”
In addition to practice, she read a lot of books and watched a lot of Food Network shows before found what works to make her buttery and flakey crust. The key to her success: working it by hand and grate the butter.
She is now pushing herself to make artistic pies with more decorative crusts.
Since she uses fresh ingredients for her fillings, her flavors change with the season. Her best seller of her fall menu includes her apple cranberry, chocolate chip pecan and the classic honey crisp apple pie.
Dodd also wanted to do something unique. She again turned to her family for inspiration and invented her sweet potato pecan pie.
“We do a sweet potato pecan casserole for the holidays, so I decided to put my own spin on it.”
Dodd describes it as a best of both worlds for people who love both sweet potato pie and pecan pie.
It is clear that her family has inspired a lot of what she does, and that is true for the name of her business as well. When Dodd was growing up her dad always said, “We’re not ordinary, we are extraordinary.” That always stuck with Dodd.
You can find Extraordinary Pie Gal online and at the Del Ray Farmers’ Market. Click here to order online. If you would like pies for the holidays Dodd suggests ordering a week in advance.
December 10, 2020 at 08:01PM
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Extraordinary Pie Gal Brings Decorative Pies to Alexandria - Alexandria Living Magazine
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