Water Pie Recipe from The Great Depression
A Great Depression-era recipe, this humble Water Pie uses the bare minimum to create a deliciously creamy, buttery dessert that proves resourcefulness can still taste like comfort. With a flaky crust, a rich brown sugar filling, and a crisp, caramelized top, you won’t believe one of the main ingredients is water!
A Quick Look At The Recipe
- Recipe Name: Water Pie
- Serves: 4
- Main Ingredients: 9-inch deep-dish pie crust, unbaked, water, all-purpose flour, sugar, vanilla extract, butter, cut into 5 pieces
- Why You'll Love It: Water Pie is a depression era recipe that turns bare bones ingredients into a delicious buttery pie!
A Sweet Legacy from the Depression Era
Just like my Chocolate Depression Cake, this water pie is one of those magical recipes born in the Depression era, when cooks with little to nothing figured out how to make delicious dishes for those they love during hard times.
This particular recipe was passed on to me by Kay West, and I published it in my third cookbook, Sweetness. It originally belonged to Kay’s grandmother, a remarkable woman who cooked three meals a day from scratch for her family of ten. During harder times, she created this recipe so her family could still enjoy a little sweetness, no matter how hard their days were. These recipes are such a special treasure to us!
I think you’ll really enjoy how simple this water pie is. It has a creamy, buttery taste, similar to a buttermilk pie or old-fashioned butter cookies. Half the thrill will be telling your family the name and that the main ingredient is water!
Ingredients
You know when a recipe was created to make something out of nothing, it’s going to be simple on the ingredients!
- A deep-dish pie crust (see tips for success at the bottom of this post).
- Water
- Sugar
- Flour
- Butter
- Vanilla extract
Tips for the Best Water Pie
- I use an unbaked Pillsbury all-vegetable frozen deep-dish pie crust for this recipe. I suggest a store-bought deep-dish pie crust because homemade pie crusts vary in depth and may not cook through in the prescribed time.
- Before you begin making this pie, tear off a piece of foil large enough to cover your pie dish. Cut an X in the center and peel back the X. This makes it quick and easy to cover your pie if the edges start to darken, and it helps you keep heat in during baking!
- The pie will be bubbly and could be watery in some spots when you pull it out of the oven. It will gel fully as it cools. Just let the pie cool completely, then cover and refrigerate until chilled before cutting.
How to Make Depression-Era Water Pie
1. Pour Water Into Pie Crust Dish
Begin by pouring water into your unbaked pie crust deep-dish. Tap water is just fine!
2. Add Flour & Sugar
Next, in a small mixing bowl, stir together your flour and sugar.
Sprinkle the flour mixture over your water in the pie shell. The original recipe called for doing this with a spoon, so I’m showing you that way, but I usually just use my hand to sprinkle it because I feel like I can get it more evenly that way.
This is our water with flour/sugar sprinkled over. Don’t stir!
3. Add Vanilla & Butter
Drizzle vanilla over this (don’t stir this either!). Then place pats of butter on top.
4. Bake
Place your pie in the oven at 400°F for 30 minutes.
After 30 minutes, reduce the temperature to 375°F and cover the edges of the flaky crust if needed to prevent burning. Cook for another 30 minutes after you reduce the temp.
5. Cool & Chill
Remove your pie from the oven. The pie will be very watery in the center – don’t worry, that’s what we want! Let it cool completely, then refrigerate for several hours before cutting.
That’s it. Enjoy this creamy, buttery pie recipe! And if you want to try one of our all-time favorite pairings with this dessert, try this Dirty Dr. Pepper – it’s so tasty!
Storage
You can store leftovers of your water pie in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days. Skip the freezer with this one! The delicate filling separates and loses its texture once thawed.
Water Pie from the Great Depression – FAQs
A Sprite pie is basically a modern-day version of the water pie. It became famous in 2020 when TikTok took the world by storm. They both taste very similar, like a delicious sugar cookie. If you’d prefer to make a Sprite pie instead of a water pie, simply substitute the water for 1 can of Sprite. Follow the same instructions and ingredients in the recipe card, and voila, you have yourself a Sprite pie!
The most common water pie mistakes are rushing the cooling process, not mixing the ingredients properly, and baking at the wrong temperature. I know it sounds simple enough, but trust me, these little slip-ups can turn your filling into a soupy mess! Make sure you give your pie enough time to cool, mix everything together thoroughly, and always double-check that your oven is set to the right temperature before popping it in.
You can’t stir a water pie because doing so messes with the chemistry that makes it work. Those unmixed layers actually create a gorgeous, gelatinous custard filling. Give it a stir, and you’ll end up with a watery disaster instead of the silky-smooth filling we’re going for.
Did you give this Water Pie a try? I’d love to hear what you thought! Drop a star rating and leave a comment below to let me know how it turned out for you.
Ingredients
- 1 9-inch deep-dish pie crust unbaked
- 1 ½ cups water
- 4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 5 tablespoons butter cut into 5 pieces
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400°F and set empty pie crust on a baking sheet.1 9-inch deep-dish pie crust
- Pour 1 ½ cups water into the pie crust.1 ½ cups water
- In a small bowl, stir together the flour and sugar. Sprinkle this mixture evenly over the water in the crust. Don't stir.4 tablespoons all-purpose flour, 1 cup sugar
- Drizzle the vanilla over the water in the pie crust. Place pats of butter on top of this.2 teaspoons vanilla extract, 5 tablespoons butter
- Bake for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 375°F and cover the sides of the crust if needed to prevent burning. Continue cooking for an additional 30 minutes.
- Pie will be watery when you pull it out of the oven but will gel as it cools. Allow to cool completely and then cover and place in the fridge until chilled before cutting.
I just baked this pie. It smells yummy! It’s been cooling on a rack but still warm. I am wondering if it’s normal to have a lot of melted butter on top? It looks like a giant puddle on top. I didn’t expect that. I was thinking that it would melt into the water mixture. I followed the recipe.
I mopped up some of the butter before covering it to refrigerate overnight. It came out perfect! All of us enjoyed a slice today. Thank you for sharing this recipe. Eileen
Here’s one oatmeal pie recipe (I see there’s one a few replies below; this is similar but uses dark corn syrup):
OATMEAL PIE
Unbaked 9″ pie shell
1/4 C butter
1/2 C sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp salt
1 C dark corn syrup
3 eggs
1 C old-fashioned oats
Cream together sugar & butter, add spices & salt, stir in corn syrup
Add eggs one at a time, stir until well-blended
Stir in oats
Pour into pie shell, bake at 350º about 1 hour until knife inserted in center comes out clean.
Cool a tad bit, then enjoy. A fine substitute for pecan pie when you’re out of nuts!
what an awesome site.I’m getting lonesome for my Memere.What a wonderful cook born in 1900 she mastered everything & fed her nine children with all manner of food.My earliest recollection is memere’s fancy pudding topped with sugar & placed under the wood stove broiler.Today it’s in fancy restaurants & called CREME BRULEE. Go figure. Memere cooked it in a huge pot enough for snacking,dessert or left overs for the next meal.That’s when she dusted it, with sugar & put under the broil to refresh it. Absolutely delicious.
I’d love to have your recipe for a big pot of it!
I would enjoy your recipes when you send email to others. I lived in GA and FL for a total of 35 yrs, but never heard of the Water Pie. Will try it soon, perhaps when my daughter and our friend visit. I bet they will not guess what is in it. Annie
I made this recipe this evening. It smells fantastic, but the butter (I think) is a watery layer on top, even at nearly room temperature. Did I do something wrong?
Hi Elaine, I just had the same thing occur. I hadn’t noticed your comment prior; I commented separately.
I make a milk pie recipe I got from my mom, she called Nanny Pie. It’s very similar but the final step is to sprinkle cinnamon on it. For those that find this a bit bland this may make all the difference.
Thanks you so much for sharing Karen!!
What better time to try a Depression Era recipe, with finances in such peril, and grocery items hard-to-come-by!!! In all honesty, I tried this completely on a lark, just out of curiosity. It is delicious! The fact that it requires so few ingredients is an added plus, and it will be a great conversation starter if we’re ever able to have guests for dinner again! Thanks for sharing. My husband loves it, and says it tops Chocolate Cream AND Key Lime Pie!!! It’s a keeper, for sure!
Oh WOW, I am so glad it was a hit!