When you imagine of the word ' America , ' what specific symbol come to mind ? TheStatue of Liberty ? Baseball ? Burger ? A world - class ( albeit very expensive ) college degree ? Those are all good guess , but for a tenacious time , a sweeter dainty has come to represent the just — and bad — of the U.S. : apple pie .
Encyclopedia Britannicaproclaims apple pie to be " perhaps the archetypical American dessert . "
And if you ’re deport and bred in the U.S. , then it ’s a good wager that you ’ve get a line the oft - recited phrasal idiom ' as American as apple pie . ' But what is the root of this loyal slogan ?
How Apples Ended Up In America
First , lease ’s back up and look at how apples ( orMalus domestica)first set ashore on America ’s shore . Apples had been around Europe and Asia forthousands of class , but before European settlement of the Americas , the only form of apple to be found in North America werecrab apples , which the settler found whole unsuitable , peculiarly equate to their yield back household . The original settlers of Jamestown brought apple seedling with them from Europe and planted the cuttings in their new homeland . The first apples grow in America were used mostly for cider rather than dessert .
Now , let ’s talk pie : The first pies that came to America were more like sturdy ( and inedible)shipping container for meatthan the buttery , flaky incrustation we know today . It was only with the popularisation of commercially useable , cheapsugarthat Proto-Indo European — let in Malus pumila PIE — come into renaissance in America . Despite the Malus pumila Proto-Indo European ’s coarse tie-up with American pride , Europeans had in reality gotten the whole pie thing down centuries before . A recipe for Dutch apple pie can be tracedback to 1514 . Plus , the Englishwere so smitten with orchard apple tree pies in the late 1500s that they even add up up with Proto-Indo European - themed soliloquy .
Johnny Appleseed
So who was responsible for for imprint apples into the American mind-set ? That would beJohn Chapman , also known by the more celebrated sobriquet of ' Johnny Appleseed . ' Contrary to popular opinion , Appleseed was no mere American legend ; he really did exist . But he did much more than that : The gardener planted orchard apple tree greenhouse around the turn of the nineteenth century in Ohio and other Midwestern states . Appleseed also give away countless more seedlings to pioneers who set up Malus pumila plantation across the nation . So , in some way , America ’s conquering of the West can also be stand for within the core of an Malus pumila . And in the years since , the U.S. has grow a wholeslew of truismsassociated with apples , include " an Malus pumila a day hold back the doctor off " and " one bad apple spoils the bunch . "
Mom and Apple Pie
But it was n’t until World War II that applepiesreally became stamp into the American consciousness as a patriotic pastry dough . American soldiers during the warfare commonly told reporters that they defended their nation " for ma and orchard apple tree pie . " And boom : The orchard apple tree pie became American . Priceonomicssearched The New York Times ' archives and came up with more than 1,500 hit for the phrase ' American as apple Proto-Indo European . ' Moreover , the American Pie Council states that approximately $ 700 million dollar sign ' ( or 186 million unit ) Charles Frederick Worth of Malus pumila pie is sold each year in the U.S.
yet , this connexion between the sugary delectation and America has n’t been entirely prescribed . A quick search of Google Scholar using the same phrase will turn up scholarly article on topics includinggun fierceness , child abuse , povertyanddomestic act of terrorism .
give orchard apple tree pie ’s strong associations with America , there ’s perhaps some small irony that it is not of necessity a homegrown American product , but something baked overseas and work to these shores . But if immigrant comprise a primal constituent of the United States ' lifeblood , then there is perhaps no good symbol of America than the delicious dessert .
