The 12 Best Pie Shops In America

Pies are, without a doubt, one of America's most beloved and iconic desserts. The saying "as American as apple pie" exists for a reason. Here are the 12 best places to get pie in the United States. 

Additional reporting by Lauren Gordon.

This article was originally published on July 27, 2015.

Three Brothers Bakery was opened in 1949 by three Holocaust survivors, the Jucker brothers. Today, the bakery is run by the same Jucker family, who sells delicious treats like the signature gingerbread cookies and modern customized cakes to suit any occasion. The pecan pie has been named "Best Mail Order Pecan Pie America Has to Offer" by Country Living Magazine, and the famous Pumpecapple Piecake, often called "the Turducken of pie and cake," stands at 11 inches tall and weighs 23.5 pounds. Why? Well, it's a three-layer cake, each containing a different pie — a pumpkin pie baked inside pumpkin spice cake, a pecan pie in chocolate cake, and an apple pie in another spice cake. It is outrageously delicious.

Since David Chang's bakery opened in 2008, chef and co-owner Christina Tosi's Momofuku Milk Bar has been creating modern, unique takes on home-style sweets. The Milk Bar's Crack Pie, a buttery pie that's basically as addictive as its name implies, is one of the most sought-after desserts at this bakery. The Milk Bar has five locations in New York City and one in Toronto.

Fox Valley's Manderfield's Home Bakery has been following its baking traditions since 1934..  Their turtle pie, which is made of caramel, chocolate, and pecans, is divine. Their custard pies — berry medley custard and rhubarb custard — are also particularly delicious. Don't miss their own version of Wisconsin's signature kringles, which are buttery Danish-like pastries, either.

If you have to choose one place to eat key lime pie in Key West, make it Kermit's. Said to be among the best on the island, Kermit's Key West Lime Shoppe is located on the shopper's haven of Duval Street. Made with all-natural ingredients and a delicious crust, this pie can also be served frozen, dipped in Belgian chocolate, and put on a stick. Here's the recipe.

Hankering for a classic Cuban dessert? Karla Bakery in Miami has everything you're looking for. Customers can enjoy mini pies and Cuban-style yemitas (egg-yolk cookies), among other sweet treats. They also offer specialty Cuban bread and classic French baguettes for those who want to skip the sweets. But why would you? Their best offering is their tropical guava pie, a fantastic, Cuban take on an American classic. 

In what was once a hardware warehouse in downtown Franklin, Merridee Erickson opened her bakery in 1984 after three years of selling her baked goods from her log cabin in nearby Fairview. Merridee's Breadbasket is still serving baked-from-scratch items. They have different pies for days of the week, and options change seasonally. We like the chocolate chess pecan (a combination of our three favorite pies — chocolate, chess, and pecan) and French coconut.   

Flour Bakery's owner and pastry chef Joanne Chang has been bringing America's sweet comfort foods to the next level since 2000. If you're just in the mood for a sweet nibble, try a customer favorite: the Chunky Lola cookie, made with oats, chocolate, coconut, and toasted pecans. For a special occasion, you simply cannot miss their pies, which you can order whole or in individual sizes. We recommend the perfectly tart lemon meringue pie. 

There's a reason we named Tartine the best bakery in America. The bakery, opened by James Beard Award-winning chefs Elisabeth Prueitt and Chad Robertson in 2002, excels at both breads and pastries. The customer favorite, however, is the banana cream pie, with its flaky crust and perfect layer of chocolate. We're definitely on board with the customers on that.

When Brian Noyes — the former art director of such magazines as Smithsonian, Preservation, and House & Garden — took a job at The Washington Post, he probably never dreamed that his hobby of making jams on the weekend at his friend's local farm would lead to an award-winning bakery. After arriving to a local farmer's market with a red truck full of baked goods to a full parking lot of hungry customers, he knew he was onto something good. He opened a storefront in Warrenton, Virginia and sells seasonal pies, jams, and cookies of the day. Be bold and order the old-fashioned mincemeat pie here; it's the only one you can order by mail. Their caramel pumpkin pie is worth the trip to Warrenton.

The feasts of medieval kings in England would sometimes include a centerpiece of live birds baked into an immense savory pie;  miraculously alive, they would fly out when the pie was cut into. While Four and Twenty Blackbirds offers no similar spectacle, their pies will please your senses on taste alone. Using local produce is key in this small bakery.  Their salted caramel apple pie, made with apples from New York state, is why you want to go in Fall, though their other seasonal offerings will not disappoint you at all. Emily and Melissa Elsen, the sisters behind this Brooklyn favorite, share a few tips with us. 

We previously wrote about Not Just Pie in our article The South's 10 Most Iconic Foods and Where to Eat Them, for their delicious pecan pie, for which they bake the pecans in the piecrust first for a more even distribution. Well, there's not just pecan pie here. According to their Facebook, peach pies are back in season right now. In Southern Living's book On The Road Again, Morgan Murphy recommends a different kind of  pie, their quiche, which is pretty much just savory goodness in their excellent, tried-and-true piecrust.  

A small shop tucked away near quiet McGolrick Park in Brooklyn's Greenpoint neighborhood, Pie Corps offers sweet and savory pies that are phenomenal, from their just-the-right-amount-of-flaky crust to their creative, seasonal fillings, such as minty chocolate with sea salt or lemon basil custard. Their signature apple crumb with rosemary is best enjoyed with a coffee, which you can take to-go and eat in the picturesque park.