Venice Williams hopes to evoke feelings of nostalgia at her sweet potato pie contest

Editor's note: This event has been indefinitely postponed due to a family illness.

Venice Williams, the executive director of Alice's Garden Urban Farm, wanted to do something to celebrate Black History Month this February. She remembered an event she held a few years ago to honor George Washington Carver, an African American agricultural scientist who became famous for his efforts to encourage peanut farming. At Williams' event, people brought their homemade offerings of things like peanut butter cookies and pecan pies for people to taste and judge.

This year, as Williams was brainstorming ideas to celebrate Black History Month, she thought back to the George Washington Carver event and decided she wanted to host another food competition. This time, though, it would be more than people bringing their dishes to taste. It would include a baking competition. And, she thought, what better thing to bake than sweet potato pie?

"We all grow tomatoes and cabbage and collard greens, but when someone says 'I'm growing sweet potatoes this year,' heads turn," said Williams. "Unfortunately, it was the transatlantic slave trade that brought sweet potatoes to the Americas, but now it's a staple of our community's diet. Like we have done with most things, we have taken something associated with a horrific period in our history and transformed it into a symbol of resilience."

Williams said the sweet potato now represents a taste of home for many Black people and that she considers sweet potato pie to be a "revered dessert in the African American community," along with banana pudding, bread pudding and caramel cake. "If you walk into the home of a Black person on Thanksgiving or Christmas or maybe even that summer cookout and there's not a sweet potato pie, you might question the event's entire authenticity," she said, laughing.

'People are gonna watch what I put in my pie?'

Considering the importance of sweet potato pie in many families' lives, it's no surprise that there's one question on potential contestants' minds. Wiliams said, "I continue to be asked by bakers, 'People are gonna watch what I put in my pie?'"

The Feb. 18 contest was to start in the final hour of the Winter Farmers Market, which runs from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays at The Table, 5305 W. Capitol Drive. Still, pies may be among the items offered by various vendors.

The three "appreciators" were to be news anchor Shannon Sims, Adija Smith, owner of Confectionately Yours and Derek Mosley, former municipal court judge and current director of Marquette University Law School's Lubar Center.

Williams gave specific reasons for choosing each judge, noting that Sims has eaten at Williams' own table more times than she can count, Smith has the taste buds of a professional baker and "everybody knows that Derek Mosley is one of the biggest foodies in the state, especially in Milwaukee's African American community."

Williams has also reassured her bakers that they don't have to reveal their recipes, adding that it's not so much the ingredients bakers want to keep secret, but the proportions of those ingredients. "I'll have to come up with little screens to protect from people seeing what's put into the pies," she said.

'You don't make just one sweet potato pie.'

That screen is important to contestant Neregin Ramsey. She can't reveal her secret because the pies are one of her bestselling items in her home-based bakery business, Reggie Bee's Bakery. And also because the recipe is her 85-year-old mother's.

Ramsey sells many items, including sweet potato pies, at the Milwaukee Winter Farmers Market. One regular customer said she was planning to come to the market a few weeks ago and that she planned to buy two of Ramsey's pies. Although she brought four pies to the market, Ramsey's potential customer didn't make it to the event until there was only one pie left. Williams overheard the customer's reaction. "She said you can go ahead and sell that to someone else; 'I can't buy just one pie from you,'" said Williams. "'I have to eat one today and freeze one for later.'"

According to Williams, when you bake a sweet potato pie, you don't make just one. "It's more like four," she said. "Or 12." That can be explained very reasonably because just a few sweet potatoes can make enough filling for several pies. But the real reason is that people don't just want to eat one pie.

What makes a sweet potato pie special?

Although Ramsey doesn't want to reveal her mom's recipe, she said a few things in her pie stand out to people.

"People always comment on how smooth it is," said Ramsey. "That's a trick with the mixer. I always use the mixer to get out most of the strings off the sweet potatoes."

She also said too many people "overdo" their sweet potato pies by adding too much cinnamon or brown sugar. She said that throws off the taste as well as the color. "If you overuse brown sugar, the pie gets too dark," said Ramsey. "This pie is always a bright, bright orange."

Although the ingredients, their proportions and the techniques are all important — enough to keep them secret under a screen — the secret ingredient that really makes each sweet potato pie special is the person who makes it.

"A sweet potato pie is just one of those things that brings up those feelings of nostalgia," said Williams. "You can be far away from home and eat a sweet potato pie at a neighbor's house or with a new friend, and it takes you back to your grandmama's kitchen or that aunt who was always commissioned to bring the pie. Because of course we're not going to eat just everyone's sweet potato pie."

Williams has two pie makers in her family. The first is her grandmother, who made the family's pies up until she was 100 years old. "Somewhere in one of my cookbook journals, I actually have her handwritten pie crust recipe," Williams said.

The other sweet potato pie specialist in Williams' family is her sister Rhonda. "Whenever my brother goes home, one thing he always wants is our sister's sweet potato pie," said Williams.

For Ramsey, her mom's sweet potato pie recipe has a history behind it. Ramsey's mother became the cook for her whole family when she was just 8 years old as her parents and siblings worked on a farm in Mississippi. "She became known for her cooking," said Ramsey. "She told me she would dream about recipes and then wake up and try them out. That's how she got started."

And although the sweet potato pie will be the star of the show at the contest, Ramsey also pointed out that her mom's recipes go beyond the pie. "Her corn bread is to die for," said Ramsey. "Her grandchildren will call her up just to ask her to make them a pan of corn bread."

Those are the stories Williams is excited to hear.

"I've asked them to share the story of the recipe, if it was handed down through their family, how they tweak it to make the recipe their own," said Williams. "And also what is evoked for them when they bake the recipe, if it reminds them of someone's kitchen or favorite family gatherings, if it makes them miss someone. It's really all about the history and the story that I love to celebrate."

About the table

Created by Venice Williams, The Table is an umbrella organization for wellness, food and art businesses as well as spiritual gatherings. Its home is the former Capitol Drive Lutheran Church, which was given to Williams after it closed because of dwindling membership. This is the first season in which The Winter Farmers Market is being held at The Table.

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Sweet potato pie contest honoring Black History Month is postponed