Peanut Butter Pie

by Vic Jameson

It started simply enough. Frances had invited some friends over for conversation and dessert.

The conversation part would be easy. We have friends who love to talk on any or all subjects, as we do, unhampered by much knowledge on the subject.

And dessert? A breeze. I would whip up a Creamy Peanut Butter Pie.

Let me tell you about making that wonderful kind of pie.

You will need ingredients: a cup of brown sugar, a cup (or a stick) of butter, 12 ounce container of whipped topping and oh yes, a cup of creamy peanut butter. And some minor elements to be described later.

You need to be picky when you’re making this pie. For example, don’t let anyone coax you into using crunchy peanut butter. It simply won’t do. And a ready-made pie crust, the graham kind, is a must. Don’t be fooled; a non-graham crust and your reputation is ruined.

The joy of Creamy Peanut Butter Pie is that it doesn’t have to be baked. You start with that cup of brown sugar. Add the butter to it and put them in a mid-size pan. Cook them over low heat. Keep stirring the concoction until it becomes neither liquid nor solid, but just the way you want it. Put the pan (and its contents of course) in the refrigerator. Don’t ask questions; just believe. Leave it there ten minutes.

While those minutes are escaping you might make sure you have all the ingredients. Aside from those small amounts to be revealed to you later, you will have placed nearby the brown sugar, butter, the whipped topping (thawed, if you want to avoid a lot of work), and . . .

If you’re a decent husband, you will have tried at least once to cook many good things in your wife’s kitchen. Wonderful recipes from your latest issue of Field and Stream. Such as fried fresh venison with spring onions and raspberry sauce. Or leftover pork chop souffle that has been aging in the fridge for six — or is it seven — weeks.

I say you “tried” at least once to create such wonders. Has it occurred to you that each time you have tried cooking there, your lady has thought of something else for you to do? Like taking up golf? Or checkers? Or repairing old cars, or volunteering for the local political party of your choice? Think on those things.

But back to the Creamy Peanut Butter pie. The last time you thought that thought, you remembered sobbing a little because when you reached for the counter, no peanut butter was there. Nor on the other cabinet. Nor in the pantry. None. Instead of sobbing, you should have been stirring the peanut butter into the brown sugar/butter mixture. Which was still in the refrigerator. With panic about to break out, I did just what any good husband would do. I asked my wife.

“It’s over there,” she said.

“Where’s ‘over there’?” I said.

“Where you put it,” she said, with the tiniest note of exasperation in her voice.

“You said it was here,” I said.

“Then look for it,” she said.

This delightful conversation could have continued, but to no avail. “I’ll have to go get some,” I said in my best martyr voice. Which brought no one to my aid.

Obviously, temper was rising in whatever room Frances was occupying. And the wonderful — well, once-wonderful — mixture was turning into rock. And panic was gaining on me rapidly.

“I’ll zip down to the supermarket and get some,” I said to no one in particular. “I’ll be back before you know I’m gone.”

Supermarkets these days are not for the timid or the quitter. I don’t know who they’re built for but I didn’t have time for wondering. Find the aisle. Find the shelf. Grab a jar of — and at this moment I saw a man wearing a lively blue vest to identify himself as an employee in the store.

“Excuse me,” I said loudly. He stopped and looked around. “Can you tell me,” I asked politely, “where the peanut butter is?”

“It’s over there,” he said, pointing vaguely to his left as he went away.

I hastened to what I thought was over there. I found cat food and little metal rings. Clotheslines and barber tools. But no peanut butter.

I saw another clerk, a woman this time. “Excuse me,” I said quickly, before someone else could get her attention. My question was short and urgent now.

“Peanut butter?”

“Over there,” she said, and pumped an arm to the left. At last we were close to communicating. But a quick trot down the aisle, skipping aisles 15 and 16 because I could see they were full of toys, and back to 13. It had women’s skirts and men’s shirts, but all this was fruitless, too. Three more “Do you haves” and two “it’s over theres” and one “try aisle 22.” I was forcing myself now not to give up. I thought if I stood still I might attract enough attention to find someone, anyone, who knew where — except “over there” — in this giant of a mercantile house I could find a small, innocent jar of creamy peanut butter.

Real panic was in my mind now. I had quizzed eleven people including a couple of people who looked like clerks and four total strangers. “Peanut butter?” I would say, and after a suspicious glance they would respond like a choir. “It’s over there.”

By now I was talking to myself. I thought I heard my own voice say, “I’d give fifty bucks for a jar of creamy peanut butter.” And three kids and the store’s assistant appeared out of nowhere. As I was now asking of everyone I met, they all knew the general location and pointed as if it were the Magic Kingdom and urged — well, you know by now what was asked and answered.

Not by my skills nor deserving — but maybe, just maybe, by my deserving — the answer appeared in front of me: A middle-sized boy, held wiggling in the arms of a large man wearing the famous blue shirt.

“Son,” he said gently, “could you help this gentleman find the peanut butter?”

“Yuh, yuh yesser,” the kid said. “It’s right behind you.”

It was. Before you could say Creamy Peanut Butter I grabbed a quart jar of it, flung a couple of dollars at the cashier as I rushed past her, and fled for home.

As I zipped through the automatic doors I heard cheering behind me. I didn’t know who or what they were cheering about but I didn’t care.

By this time I realized all my work on the pie was lost. The brown sugar and the butter would have bonded like a rock. But I had not given up and by golly I had survived the great plague of “over there.”

Home and happy again, I took the frozen glop out of the fridge and set pan and all aside to clean up another day. I measured out a cup of brown sugar and another of butter into a medium size pan. Put it over small heat and watched it carefully as it changed into the magic mixture. Shoved it in the refrigerator. Took it out after ten minutes and put it in the larger pan with the peanut butter, (I may have uttered a small cussword as I did) and put the electric mixer to work on the mix. Added the whipped topping and mixed it some more (another minute or so) until it quits resisting. It all mixes better and easier if the whipped topping has been thawed a bit.

It will appear that you have used too much topping and you may wonder what you’re going to do with it, because the cat doesn’t like sweets. But keep stirring. All will be well.

When it is, pour your mixture into that graham crust. You’ll think you’re through but not quite. Put two ounces of baking chocolate (or chocolate chips), two tablespoons of butter, and two tablespoons of milk into a little pan. Mix it well over low heat. Cool it and pour it over the pie as an icing. Put it in the fridge for at least two hours, or overnight. And keep a watchful eye on any kids or most adults who become fascinated with the kitchen.

On the day I’ve been describing I walked into the living room, guests were trying to make small talk but mostly looked as though they were wondering if they had come to the wrong place.

“Where’s the pie?” my beloved asked.

And you can’t imagine the glee with which I told her, “It’s over there.”