A luscious filling resting on a tender crust, who can resist a good pie?

“We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie” is an oft repeated refrain from Chicago playwright David Mamet’s Boston Marriage.

If your holiday gatherings require a stress reducing component and you want to take Mamet’s advice, you have options.

Hawaiian Pie Company makes buttery fruit pies and decadent cream pies that would convince even the most discerning palate that grandma is in the kitchen. Or in the case of Hawaiian Pie Company, it would be grandpa. Founded in 1979, Richard Hori opened a bakery in the back of Manoa Valley and after retiring to Hawai‘i Island would continue to bake with his son Joel, using recipes handed down from his father.

Lucky for us, Richard’s grandchildren felt a yearning to return to the memories of their childhood and started Hawaiian Pie Company in 2015. Popular pies include a pear and liliko‘i pie, POG — passion, orange and guava and a pear peach pie. Most of the fruit pies are available frozen — all the better to serve warm with a slice of ice cream. Gourmet online grocer Goldbelly ships nationwide. The frozen pies are available at Hawai‘i supermarkets and can also be ordered online at hawaiianpieco.com.

Beyond savoring a delicious pie, baking a tart or pie can be an act of love. Kecia Lum has been the designated baker for her family’s gatherings for the last 24 years, self-taught, she amassed a collection of recipes and articles now organized in binders to make the perfect desserts for family. Her go-to cookbooks at the start of the learning curve were Stars Desserts, Emily Luchetti and Chez Panisse Desserts: A Cookbook, Lindsey Shere. “Cooking and baking for your family and friends is really about showing them that you love them,” says Lum. During the early days of the pandemic Lum found comfort in sharing her passion for baking and posting her efforts on Instagram.

“Being able to share that love and passion with people who were once complete strangers was a little bit of a scary experience but also a very gratifying one. Everyone needs a little more love right now, and if I can give a little love in a small baked good and that person gives kind words back to me, that feels like a good thing,” says Lum, who moved to the Bay Area for college and never left. Her desserts are often a reflection of her Hawai‘i upbringing and Chinese and Japanese heritage. When she decided to create a dessert based on memory and a dessert she loved, she started with dan tats — the Chinese egg custard tarts.

Lum visited 10 different Chinese bakeries in San Francisco’s Chinatown and Richmond district, going with friends each time, so she could get their opinion as well. The rule was to eat the dan tat on the spot to get the freshest taste and then rate each one from 1-5, while she would make tasting notes. In the process of eating all the dan tats she realized the tart is a simple marriage of two things: custard and crust. The custard had to be the right texture (not too thin or dense) and the right taste (not overly eggy or sweet). The crust needed to be crisp and flaky and have a buttery, not margarine like taste.

Unable to find from scratch recipes for dan tats in cookbooks, Lum went online to do her research. Testing a short, sweet pastry crust first, because it was the easier of two options. But baking further, she decided she preferred option two, a puff pastry crust which became a whole journey in itself, since she had never made puff pastry before. Several puff pastry recipes later, Lum settled on one and then continued to refine that recipe and technique for a couple of years. She put the custard filling to the same testing process, settling on one with a texture and taste she liked. Experimenting with different flavors, she created kabocha (pumpkin) dan tats for the holidays.

“I feel like the road to create my idea of the perfect dan tat pretty much exemplifies my approach to baking and life. Part inspiration, memories and intuition” says Lum.

Whether you buy or bake it yourself, we can all benefit from a good slice.