Key Lime Pies of Michigan: September 2010

Introduction

I have a friend who orders a turkey club sandwich for lunch at every restaurant he goes to. If there's a turkey club on the menu, that's what he gets. There's something nice about that; his hope is that he'll see something familiar on his plate, something he knows. My father, on the other hand, orders chili for lunch whenever it appears on the menu. His hope is quite different. Because the word Chili means very different things to different people, he always hopes that the chili he gets is something he hasn't seen before.

This blog is somewhere between those two ideas of ordering the same thing in different places. For years, I've loved key lime pie. The best I've had was down in the Florida Keys when I was a teenager going to visit my cousins. But that was a long time ago and I had a teenager's large appetite and low standards. How different are the various key lime pies from each other? What makes for a good or bad key lime pie experience? I'm not sure, but I'm going to try to find out by tasting a bunch of them.

The posts on this blog will illuminate the key lime pies available in Michigan (and possibly other places as well). Each entry will judge a different restaurant's idea of just what a key lime pie ought to be. Criteria for judging include presentation, crust, filling, topping, originality, and tradition. All that will be cooked down to a rating in limes--one, two, three, or four limes, with four limes being the highest.

If you know of a truly wonderful or original key lime pie, e-mail me and I'll check out, giving you credit of course.

Happy reading,

Jon

Thursday, September 30, 2010

KLP 1: Carlyle, Ann Arbor

Carlyle Grill on Jackson Road in Ann Arbor is a fine place to have a drink and dinner before seeing a movie at Quality 16 theatres. It's spacious, not terribly loud, and has good service.

There are only four desserts on the menu; key lime pie is one. Carlyle's entry is pictured at left. Here's how it fared:

Presentation: A fairly traditional presentation. Pie with twist of lime on top, whipped cream on the side with a strawberry for decoration.

Crust: A flavorful graham cracker style crust. Notes of ginger and cinammon gave it interest.

Filling: Authentic flavor of limes was a strength of the filling. Texture of the filling was a bit more solid and rubbery than it might have been, but was generally good.

Topping: Is it still topping if it's off to the side? I guess so. Pretty basic whipped cream topping. Good, but with nothing particularly interesting about it.

Original elements: The flavoring of the crust was unusual. Unexpected and a good complement to the citrus of the filling.

Traditional elements: Presentation was standard for this dish. Comforting, but would have benefitted from some spark of originality in presentation.

Rating: Three limes out of four. Satisfying, flavorful both in the strong citrus of the filling and the unusual notes of the crust.