Where our ingredients come from

Our pies taste like Pennsylvania because most of the ingredients actually come from Pennsylvania. The apples in our signature Apple Pie are a mix of Granny Smith and Honeycrisp, both grown locally and chosen because one holds its shape and the other goes soft and sweet — together they do exactly what an apple filling should do. From May through August, the Strawberry Rhubarb uses strawberries from a farm just down the road and rhubarb from Snavely's, which means the filling in your slice was probably growing in a field nearby about a week ago. The cream in our custards and whipped toppings comes from a Lancaster County creamery, and you can taste the difference — richer, a little more golden, nothing like the shelf-stable stuff.

A few things Clarisse does by hand

Not everything is about sourcing. Some of it is just the extra step that most places skip.

• Toasted pecans. Every Pecan Pie starts with a full pan of pecans going into the oven before anything else. Toasting them first is what gives the filling that deep, almost caramel-roasted flavor underneath the sweetness.
• Fresh-juiced key limes. The Key Lime Pie uses limes we juice in-house. Clarisse will tell you the bottled concentrate tastes like soap. She's not wrong.
• Roasted sweet potatoes. For the Sweet Potato Pie (November–December), we roast the potatoes instead of boiling them, which concentrates the flavor and keeps the filling from going watery.

What we can't promise

We source locally when we can, but availability shifts with the seasons and the harvest. The Strawberry Rhubarb is only on the menu from May through August, and some years the local strawberry window is shorter than others — when local fruit isn't available, that pie simply isn't on the menu. The Apple and Pecan are year-round because the sourcing is more consistent, but the specific farms can vary.

One thing that doesn't change: everything is baked in our kitchen at 47 N Hanover St, by the same small crew, in the same ovens. Clarisse has been running that kitchen for years, and she'd rather pull a pie than let a shortcut out the door.

If you have questions about a specific ingredient — especially for allergy reasons — Clarisse answers those personally. Drop us a line and we'll get you a real answer, not a label read-back.

Curious about something you don't see here? Reach out at support@perfectpies.club and we'll ask the kitchen directly.