Grab a slice while celebrating Pi Day in Waterloo region: Jasmine Mangalaseril
Social Sharing
March 14 is Pi Day. Although many math-leaning sorts will celebrate the result of dividing a circle's circumference by its radius, it's a day everyone can mark with pie.
The date, first celebrated in the United States in 1988, lined up perfectly with the mathematical constant: 3.141592653…
In Waterloo, when Henry and Dianne de Jong opened Sweet and Savoury Pie Company, they didn't realize how important Pi Day was in the Region.
"Of course, with two big universities, colleges, the Perimeter Institute, you've got a lot of math and science-oriented and -focused careers and studies and that sort of thing," said Dianne de Jong.
They held their first Pi Day in 2015.
"People were getting pies. We were lined up out the door so they could be home at 9:26 and be eating that pie at 9:26 and 53 seconds, because that's the number," added Henry de Jong.
There is no official flavour or type of pie to celebrate the mathematical constant, as Henry de Jong explained.
"People just want pie on Pi Day. Some people look at it and go, 'I'll have a quiche for breakfast. I'm going to have a meat pie for lunch. I'll have something for dinner, but I'm going to have pie for dessert.' Or they'll do pie, pie, pie."
A world of pies
A picture perfect latticed cherry pie or golden domed chicken pot pie may immediately jump to mind, but given pie is simply a food with a crust, the world of pie is as varied as its fillings.
With the Middle East home to a cradle of civilization, some of the world's oldest pies can be found there. One is sfiha (or sfeeha), which is a round flatbread topped with chopped or minced lamb or beef, that is mildly seasoned with pepper, onions, parsley and tomatoes.
"It's sort of like a mini pie. We put meat and spread it on top," explained Adam Alhares, who along with his family, owns Kitchener's Damask Resto-Market. "It's usually, flat and more in a circle shape. And we have many like variations of it. Some people put pomegranate. Some people put lemon with it."
Along with manaeesh (a flatbread similar to sfiha, sometimes topped with za'atar), Damask also prepares other oven-baked fatayer (savoury handheld pies). Their boat-shaped pies are filled with cheese or mhammara (or muhammara), a ground mixture made of nuts, red bell peppers, pomegranate molasses and breadcrumbs. And their pyramid-like pies are stuffed with spinach.
While Damask's spinach fatayer feature crimped seams, Melina's spinach and cheese-bundled spanakopita are a Mediterranean relative.
"Spanakopita is actually spinach pie in Greek," said Nathalia Zuniga, who owns Melina's in Kitchener with her husband Mel Ioannou. "Spanakopita is layers of filo stuffed with spinach and feta cheese…it's very traditional in Greece and in Cyprus. [It's] served all the time."
At Melina's, spanakopita is made into baked filo-wrapped triangle of varying sizes, from cocktail-sized to larger handhelds for a hearty snack or light lunch. They'll also be made into cushions and served with sides for a meal.
The Greek-Latino fusion takeaway also makes several Central American and South American sweet and savoury pies. Their staff, from Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, prepare pastelitos and empanadas as they would at home.
Most are half-moon shaped (but Chilean ones look more like a rectangular pocket), using either corn meal or wheat flour for the envelope that holds their fillings. Some are deep fried while others are baked.
Their sweet pies can be filled with tropical fruit, dulce de leche or coconut, while their savoury offerings are filled with any combination of beef, chicken, potatoes, ham.
"The Colombians have mashed potatoes mixed with the beef or chicken, and a little bit of cumin makes them stand out. The Venezuelan is similar, but the difference is that they are not stuffed with potatoes," said Zuniga. "When it comes to taste...they're both delicious, but completely different taste, even though they look very similar."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Winnipeg Free Press
4 days ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Finding the right touch
With their latest original stage production, opening tonight at Prairie Theatre Exchange, Sick + Twisted is inviting audiences not just to look and to listen, but to feel. Before each performance of Neither Here Nor There, up to eight guests will have the opportunity to be led onto the Cherry Karpyshin Mainstage for a 'touch tour,' allowing low-vision, blind and sighted audience members alike to experience the set and gain an understanding of the production's non-traditional geography. Playing on a traverse stage, also known as a corridor or alley, the company's adaptation of the legend of the blind seer Tiresias places audiences on either side of the action, says director Debbie Patterson. BROOK JONES / FREE PRESS Tyler Sneeby (left) and Vivi Dabee star in Neither Here Nor There. With the stage bisected by a sheer curtain, the audience can only see half of the show clearly, the other blurred by the barricade. The staging and the touch tour play into the trailblazing company's commitment to disability esthetics, using lived experience with disability as an opportunity for exploration and discovery rather than a barrier to experience, says Patterson. 'When you can't walk across the room, every other way becomes available to you,' she says. One of the production's three blind actors describes their experience with vision loss as one of 'limitless possibility.' 'We embrace the barriers we face as potent catalysts for discovery and innovation, so the esthetic choices in this production have been arrived at through this process, giving us this utterly new approach to making theatre. No one else is making theatre like this,' says Patterson. By decentring vision as a prerequisite for participation, the company was able to emphasize theatre as a complete sensory experience, with a script that expresses every action with a corresponding audio cue, designed by Dasha Plett, who was just nominated for a Toronto theatre award — a Dora — for her work in Buddies in Bad Times' production of Roberto Zucco. 'All the props are mimed, but the sound effects are hyperrealistic,' Patterson says. Created and performed by a team of blind and transgender artists, Neither Here Nor There had its start during the pandemic when Patterson sought to create a work developed by members of both communities. 'One participant wrote a song about how being blind felt like being neither here nor there, and that idea of being in an in-between really resonated with some of the trans artists,' Patterson says. The show's cast includes Lara Rae as the production's hostess, a cross between a Greek chorus and a standup comic who periodically comments on the action. Tyler Sneesby, a.k.a. DJ Hunnicutt, plays Zeus. Plett and Gislina Patterson (We Quit Theatre) also appear, as do Vivi Dabee as Tiresias and Vivian Cheung as the character's modern counterpart, Ti. Making their stage debut is m patchwork monoceros, who also designed the set. BROOK JONES / FREE PRESS The stage is split by a sheer curtain so the audience can only see half of the show clearly. 'My character is a person who has vision, who can see the future, who understands trends, but because she knows so much, she keeps herself small, experiencing a type of loneliness no one else can understand,' says Cheung, a blind actor, triathlete, author, graphic novelist, accessible yoga instructor and Dora-nominated theatre creator from Toronto performing in Winnipeg for the first time. 'Oftentimes, when a person lives with a physical disability, they have to explain themselves repeatedly until they're heard, and that gets very fatiguing. I can't stress enough that we need more listening in this world, more quiet participation and quiet leadership.' Weekday Evenings Today's must-read stories and a roundup of the day's headlines, delivered every evening. That's what Cheung says she found working with Sick + Twisted, which implemented her insights into the way the production took shape. The script calls for Ti to make a stir-fry in her home kitchen, but when the actor pointed out that if she were holding a cellphone while doing it, it would end up in the wok, the team quickly decided with Cheung to mime all of the cooking actions instead. 'Now our sound designer Dasha is choreographing the sound to support my cooking. It's become a duet in cooking between miming and movement, with the stage manager timing the sizzling and the sounds of vegetables going into the wok,' says Cheung 'It's a collaboration in every sense of the word.' Ben WaldmanReporter Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University's (now Toronto Metropolitan University's) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben. Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Toronto Star
4 days ago
- Toronto Star
Egypt says the sovereignty of a famous monastery is assured
CAIRO (AP) — Egypt says the sovereignty of a famous monastery is assured. Egypt's foreign minister on Wednesday told his Greek counterpart that the spiritual and religious value of the Saint Catherine Monastery and surrounding archaeological sites will be preserved. That's according to a statement. The Greek Orthodox Church had been concerned after an administrative court said the state owns the land but affirmed the monks' right to use the site. The Patriarchate of Jerusalem last week expressed concern and said 'it is our sacred obligation to ensure that Christian worship continues on this holy ground, as it has done for 17 centuries.' It acknowledged Egypt's assurances there would be no infringement. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW Egypt's presidency last week said the ruling consolidates the state's commitment to preserve the monastery's religious status.
Winnipeg Free Press
4 days ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Egypt says the sovereignty of a famous monastery is assured
CAIRO (AP) — Egypt says the sovereignty of a famous monastery is assured. Egypt's foreign minister on Wednesday told his Greek counterpart that the spiritual and religious value of the Saint Catherine Monastery and surrounding archaeological sites will be preserved. That's according to a statement. The Greek Orthodox Church had been concerned after an administrative court said the state owns the land but affirmed the monks' right to use the site. Sundays Kevin Rollason's Sunday newsletter honouring and remembering lives well-lived in Manitoba. The Patriarchate of Jerusalem last week expressed concern and said 'it is our sacred obligation to ensure that Christian worship continues on this holy ground, as it has done for 17 centuries.' It acknowledged Egypt's assurances there would be no infringement. Egypt's presidency last week said the ruling consolidates the state's commitment to preserve the monastery's religious status.
