There's nothing like apple pie in the fall. A collector paid $4,750 for this redware apple pie plate but probably not to use for cooking. Redware was the first pottery made by European colonists after settling in America. It was used mostly for baking and cooking because it holds heat well and uniformly. Redware was widely used until stoneware and ironstone became popular in the middle of the 19th century, but it is still made today.

Colonists also brought the apple seeds and apple tree seedlings that were the beginnings of our abundant apple crop as well as their own versions of apple pies and tarts. Americans have been making and writing about apple pies since. When the economy was bad during the Depression, apple pie was made the cheap way with crackers instead of apples.

Find more redware prices on Kovels.com and in Kovels' Antiques and Collectibles 2009 Price Guide. And here is a recipe from the 1896 Boston Cooking-School Cook Book, by Fannie Merritt Farmer to make in a redware pie plate.

Apple Pie I

4 or 5 sour apples
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon butter
1 teaspoon lemon juice
Few gratings lemon rind

Line pie plate with paste (crust as we know it, made of flour, lard, salt and water). Pare, core and cut the apples into eighths, put row around plate one-half inch from edge, and work towards centre until plate is covered; then pile on remainder. Mix sugar, nutmeg, salt, lemon juice, and grated rind, and sprinkle over apples. Dot over with butter. Wet edges of under crust, cover with upper curst, and press edges together.

Bake forty to forty-five minutes in moderate oven. A very good pie may be made without butter, lemon juice, and grated rind. Cinnamon may be substituted for nutmeg. "Evaporated" apples may be used in place of fresh fruit. If used, they should be soaked over night in cold water.