Martin Luther King Jr Had A Sweet Tooth For This Southern Dessert

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History has a way of reducing great figures to their greatest moments, but the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was as fully human as any of us — a man who loved baseball, cherished his family, and, yes, had opinions about dessert. And MLK had a few favorites in the dessert department, including peach cobbler and a beloved family recipe he and his siblings affectionately called "Quilly." But one dessert that made a big impression on King, and one that shouldn't surprise anyone who knows their Southern baking, was pecan pie.

Alexander Smalls, James Beard chef, shared in an article on The Spruce Eats that Dr. King had a particular fondness for the dessert. "In no special order," Smalls said in the article, "he was known to enjoy as frequently as possible, a generous serving of fried chicken, stewed greens, sweet potatoes, and for dessert, a slice or two of pecan pie." And it's hard to argue with MLK's taste. Pecan pie is one of those quintessentially Southern sweets that earns its place at the table — deeply sugary, rich with toasted nuts, and the kind of thing that makes you sit back and slow down for a minute.

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Depending on where you are, there are some great pecan pies to buy at the supermarket. But if you really want to honor the spirit of the thing, making a pecan pie yourself isn't as daunting as it sounds, and the result is likely to be better. It's one of the most forgiving bakes out there, built from some simple pantry staples that Southern grandmothers have been assembling for generations.

The nuts are, obviously, the major part of the operation, and it makes sense why pecan pie is so attached to the South. Georgia alone accounts for roughly one-third of all pecan production in the United States, and Texas rounds things out at the top of the pecan-producing states — a state that takes the dessert so seriously it officially designated pecan pie as its state pie. 

For the filling itself, the classic Southern method is beautifully simple. You only need sugar, brown sugar, salt, corn syrup, vanilla, butter, and eggs. Whisk them together, then add your pecans and bake it at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about an hour. If the crust starts to cook too quickly, add a tent of foil about halfway through. You'll know it's done when the edges are set and the center has just a slight jiggle — not soupy, not stiff. Let it cool for a few hours before slicing so the filling can set up properly. You can serve it warm with some vanilla ice cream, but it's perfectly delicious served cold out of the fridge.