A House That Pies Built
Life is so much better with pie. It’s the proof that we are loved. And, this time of the year, we who are lucky enough to be breathing in the perfumed air of Northern Michigan are rewarded with pie from the House of Pies in Alanson.
Growing up in Fountain, Michigan, the three Dombrouski sisters would play in the kitchen while their mother, Dolores, baked cream pies for friends and family. They couldn’t imagine that 50 years later, the bakery she founded in Alanson would be selling more than 100 pies a day this time of year and up to 300 on July 3 and Thanksgiving. Dolores still uses the same blue-handled pastry scissors she used 50 years ago, but has handed down the carefully guarded recipes to her daughter, Cindy Sischo, who now owns the House of Pies.
“Nobody touches those scissors. Nobody changes a recipe by a single step or even a pinch,” Cindy says. “Or else, be prepared to answer to Dolores!” These women take pie very seriously. Their love and loyalty to the craft of baking is evident in every bite.
In 2001, Cindy put on an apron and joined Dolores full time to bake pies, pastries and cookies in the little yellow house with the pink door on US-31, about eight miles north of Petoskey on Crooked Lake. Painted in hot pink cursive on the porch steps is a warm welcome: “It’s officially pie season!” For Cindy and her devoted crew of seven, pie comes first every day.
Cindy started pouring herself into the business with unrelenting vigor after her only daughter, Megan, lost her three-year battle withepithelioid sarcoma cancer in 2014 at the age of 37. “I went crazy and threw myself into the shop and just started baking instead of coming home to an empty house. That’s how we added the cookies and pastries. I tried baking everything and filled up the cases and it went over just fantastic.” Pie is therapy.
“I’m up at 4 in the morning, at the bakery by 5, and don’t get home until around 9 at night,” says Cindy. “We sell 100–150 pies in the busy season and my helpers do not bake pies at all until they have been here for at least three years.”
Using Dolores’s recipes, all the pastry and fillings are made from scratch withexacting measurements prescribed by the original baker who stands sentinel over the kitchen four days a week at age 81. Dolores can still make 100 pies in her four hours in the kitchen. “Someone is rolling out the pastry for her, but she’s making pies fast,” says Cindy proudly.
THE MAGIC IN THE KITCHEN
Soft cotton pastry cloths are spread across a well-worn butcherblock table in the cheery kitchen behind the antique pie safe and vintage cabinets that are the front counters at the House of Pies. The pastry is rolled out and cut by hand, lovingly laid into Pyrex pie plates.
Cherries from Smeltzer Orchard outside Frankfort fill the bakery’s number one seller, the cherry pastry-top pie. William Smeltzer planted one of the first Michigan fruit orchards back in 1872, around the same time the house where the pies are baked was built. Following close behind in popularity are the cherry crumb-top and cherry pecan crumb pies, which pair perfectly with barbecue and friends.
For two precious weeks at the end of July, black raspberries will be harvested from a private garden in Harbor Springs where these cousins to the red raspberry (not to be confused with the larger, shinier blackberry) are grown just for the House of Pies. Cindy takes pride in partnering with local private growers who will provide the freshest fruit for her pies. The 100 pounds of rhubarb she uses each day when it’s in season comes from a young farmer who is working from his grandfather’s land near Cheboygan. While rhubarb is technically a vegetable, there is nothing but sweet perfection in a fork-full of rhubarb pie, usually available through the first week of August at House of Pie.
The four berry crumb-top pie (this writer’s all-time favorite) has cherries from Smeltzer’s and wild blueberries, blackberries and raspberries from local growers. In one bite, you’ll taste everything that is special about summer: sunshine, sweetness and love.
It’s magic for breakfast with yogurt (to make you feel better about eating pie for breakfast). It’s heaven with an afternoon coffee on the porch. And a piece for dessert as the sun dips down across the bay promises sweet dreams.
The wild blueberry pies fly out the door. Cradling these prized local berries is a crust that is flaky but substantial. A guarded recipe in this busy kitchen where baking is second to breathing. Each week this month, 600 pounds of flour and 200 pounds of butter are carefully measured, sifted, cut and mixed then cut by hand.
Customers can take home a pie (or three) in a classic white box with a pink logo. This summer, though, you’ll want to linger in the larger café area, with newly sanded floors (thanks to Cindy’s husband, Ron), more antique seating and a screened-in porch. The coffee comes from Hawaiian Isles Kona Coffee Co. Cindy spent winters with her daughter in Oahu when Megan was stationed at Schofield Barracks as a staff sergeant in the U.S. Army. She had earned her master’s degree, and was on her way to a doctorate before she got sick. “Serving that coffee is a way to keep her in the bakery.”
Her customers helped Cindy and her family push through that very painful time. “We have a very strong return-customer base. Our customers are like family,” Cindy says.
And now, she has a whole pie family to bake for.
IF YOU GO:
House of Pies
4577 N. US-31, Alanson • 231-347-6525
PIES AT BAY VIEW
Starting this summer, the House of Pies will be taking their show on the road. Pies, cookies and pastries (including their new cream cheese pinwheels) will be for sale at the Bay View Gathering Post, the cozy café and shop at the post office on the campus of historic Bay View, just north of Petoskey, where music, lectures and classes are open to the public all summer long. Additional orders will be filled twice a week and delivered to the Gathering Post. Check the website BayViewAssociation.org for hours. There is plenty of parking out in front of this picturesque spot. Or, take your treat across the street to the park and sit and swing while looking out over Little Traverse Bay.
