ELK CITY — The French silk pie served at Country Dove Gifts & Tea Room has garnered worldwide interest among Route 66 travelers from Germany, Sweden, Japan and in Oklahoma, too.
The pie's nutty crust, dense chocolate filling that's, well, as smooth as silk and the fluffy whipped sweet cream topping dusted with a bit more chocolate has inspired many words of praise, but none more unusual than those of a writer who gushed it was so heavenly, he didn't know whether to eat the pie or slather it on his skin.
That author's glowing words, which have amused the tearoom's owners, appeared in a Route 66 guidebook published 16 years ago. The book became popular among Europeans planning trips along Route 66. Then the worldly tourists started lining up on the front porch of the prairie home along Third Street to sample the pie.
Since that time, Oklahomans and tourists from other states have weighed in on the pie's merits, too. Cookbook author Marian Clark of Tulsa included the pie recipe in "The Route 66 Cookbook" (Council Oak Books, 1993), and that kindled even more interest in the pie and the tearoom itself, with its seating for 40 diners.
"The French silk pie recipe is from a cookbook, I think it was originally from an Arkansas tearoom," said Kay Farmer, co-owner of the Country Dove. "My mother-in-law adapted the pie recipe for us. She came up with the nut crust," she said.
When Farmer and her partner, Glenna Hollis, opened the Country Dove in 1988, Farmer had never baked a pie in her life. Today, she is constantly making piecrusts to fill to meet the customer demand.
"I oversee and make all the food personally here," Farmer said. "I do it. You don't find that very often, but we're particular about the freshness of the food and how it is served."
One of the challenges of operating a tearoom is the amount of work it takes to turn out freshly prepared food daily. "It takes a real team effort, and that's what we have here." The team includes two waitresses, two dishwashers, two who work on the gift side and backup help to call on when emergencies occur. Farmer oversees the kitchen, and Hollis is in charge of gifts and the books.
The tearoom's menu also includes specialties such as the heart-shaped bran muffins, chicken-avocado sandwich, chicken and dressing (think casserole), three homemade soups including the hearty cream
