The Radical Pie That Fueled a Nation

But the deceptively simple pie is one of the most enduring symbols of revolutionary black power that dates back from the civil rights movement. It has been referenced in television points to and rap music, and Will Smith feasted on it with friends on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

The bean pie came to prominence through the Nation of Islam, a black nationalist and social reform movement founded in 1930. Led by controversial figures like Malcolm X and Elijah Muhammad, the Nation preached a separatist movement that rejected all enforced doctrines of white society, from clothing to surnames to religion.

The Nation’s leaders maintained that many dishes and elements traditional to black foodways, particularly soul food, were relics of the “slave diet” and had no part in the lives of contemporary African-Americans. As Elijah Muhammad, who led the Nation from 1934 to 1975, wrote in his two-book series How to Eat to Live , “You know as well as I that the white race is commercializing people and they do not worry about the lives they jeopardize so long as the dollar is safe.

You might find yourself eating death if you follow them.” As a result, the Nation of Islam created its own radical—and somewhat idiosyncratic—new diet for his followers to adhere to, one influenced by both health and identity. In How to Eat to Live , which was published in 1967, Muhammad emphasized vegetarianism, consuming whole grains. Vegetables, and limiting sugar, processed grains, and traditional soul food elements, like sweet potatoes, corn, collard greens, and pork—the latter of which was vehemently forbidden to Nation members in accordance with Muslim law.

Yet we cannot live [half] that length of time eating everything that the Christian table has set for us.” The navy bean was used in a number of new Muslim recipes published in cookbooks and pamphlets, including soups, salads, and even cake frosting. But it was via the bean pie that it truly rose to prominence. Going to Lance Shabazz, an archivist and historian of the Nation of Islam,, the pie allegedly came from the Nation’s original founder, Wallace D.

In the 1930s, fard Muhammad, who supposedly bestowed the method upon Elijah Muhammad and his wife, Clara. Even if Muhammad never explicitly mentioned the bean pie in How to Eat to Live , it quickly rose to prominence in the black Muslim community. As Shabazz wrote, the boxer so loved the pie that he even blamed it for his loss to Joe Frazier in the 1971 heavyweight title fight, having been unable to resist slices during his training.

Eventually, the bean pie became one of the defining hallmarks of the black Muslim diet—a “juggernaut,” to use Nelson’s term, that was a mainstay on dinner tables and in bakeries, and a fund-raising tool to support the initiatives of the Nation in communities across the United States. By baking the pie, Muslim African-Americans rejected the social bonds imposed by white society and instead created a new identity, in the process establishing their own foothold in American culinary traditions. Queen Latifah being presented with a community activism award in 1994, along with a bean pie. A copy of The Final Call (from the Cornell Hip Hop Collection: Bill Adler Archive) The bean pie has since become a fixture in African-American culture, referenced in rap, comedy, television, and movies, from Queen Latifah’s song “Just Another Day” to In Living Color .

It continues to be served after mosque services and sold on street corners both whole and in smaller, snack-size portions, typically with a copy of The Final Call, the Nation of Islam’s newspaper. And of course, the bean pie is on the menu at landmark Muslim bakeries, such as Your Black Muslim Bakery in Oakland and Abu’s Bakery in Brooklyn.

And as Braithwaite tells me, it exists “along the lines of being creative, being innovative, taking sort of what you’ve been presented with and making something unique and awesome.” It’s a lot of potent symbolism to ascribe to a humble pie, Braithwaite is quick to admit.