The Heart of the Table | Generations & Legacy

Talking Pie and a Generational Legacy

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And not just any Southern girl, either. Amanda Wilbanks, owner of the Southern Baked Pie Company spent part of her Friday afternoon on the phone with us, dishing on all-butter crusts, pies as small as a tassie and as large as a wagon wheel, blackberry pies made with fresh, organic Georgia blueberries, and her savory chicken pot pie that is her favorite to eat but the hardest to make.

“I used to love to make chicken pot pie with my Grandma, who I called Betty. We had to cook the chicken first, which took hours. The pie doesn’t have vegetables like a lot of people think, but its simple, honest ingredients: chicken, dumplings, and salt are heavenly.” We eagerly await Grandma Betty’s recipe, but it’s an ancestral secret for now!

A Taste of Prague in Georgia

“I admit I’ve gained a few pounds,” Amanda chuckled, “but I’ve never been happier. Making a cookbook is hard work, but my friends helped me test every recipe and arrange all the photo shoots. We had so much fun. Sure, it was 12 hour days for a solid month, but we nibbled and hung out as friends. Amazing.”

As an author of many cookbooks myself, I can relate to the arduous but beautiful architectural marathon. Like me, Amanda’s recipes are also heavily inspired by travel.

“About ten years ago, I was studying abroad,” she said, “and when I was in Prague I had my first taste of a made-from-scratch pastry. It was a tart. When I bit into it, I was shocked at how good it was; the custard was warm, and the dough the softest and most buttery I’d ever had. The fruit inside the tart shell was perfectly sweet.”

When Inspiration Sparks Connection

It was a perfect segue. I told her about Canvas and Cuisine, with Sue’s oil paintings of far-flung farmer’s markets and the exotic recipes they inspired me to create. I think the three of us are such like-minded individuals that I sent Sue some of Amanda’s pies. I myself tasted the pies’ marvelousness when someone gifted them to me through the mail.

She told me she spends most of her time at her Gainesville HQ, but does drop by her other stores from time to time, ready to roll up her sleeves, get out her pre-refrigerated pie making ingredients, and make what she loves. And this, would be her family’s dream. The entrepreneur says her mother-in-law, Sandy Wilbanks got the whole thing started by showing Amanda how to make buttermilk pie.

From the Archives: The Southern Baked Crumb

An Artisanal Future

Her very favorite right now is chocolate chess pie, which tastes especially good washed down with a glass of Prosecco, a few ripe berries floating on top. Her husband, Alex convinced her to sell her pies professionally, and it’s to him, whom she dedicates her cookbook. “Alex is the one who always believed in me the most.”

If you bring a hankering for the blackberry pies—a favorite of Southern Baked this summer—you will almost always be in luck for a fresh baked encore. But who knows? It could be anything. No notion is too pie-in-the-sky here when it's built on neighborly grace.

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