REINERTON — Once isn’t enough.
It happens twice a year that volunteers at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Reinerton prepare the church’s homemade meat pies as a fundraiser — February and November.
Fans of the pies have been supporting the church effort for the past decade, boosting sales every year to nearly 440 pies this year, according to Dale Oxenrider, church treasurer.
Oxenrider said the recipe for the “9-inch extra deep dish meat pies” comes from Bette Brown, who is a member of the church and a former owner of the Brown Jug restaurant. Oxenrider said when Brown stopped making the pies herself, he and other church volunteers assumed the role, carrying on the church tradition.
On Wednesday more than a dozen volunteers worked to get the pies boxed and ready for pickup from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. today at the 1931 Wiconisco St. church. Other pies will be freshly assembled for pickup Friday and Saturday.
“It’s good fellowship and we all get along,” Oxenrider said, noting it’s a nearly weeklong process.
Volunteers who usually assist with the pie-making include: Harvey Moore, Chris Weaver, Clarence Herman, Ted Unger, Calvin Shoffler, Jack Klinger, Jean Shoffler, Judy Klinger, Kathryn Lewis, Marie Herman, Barb Ossman, Carol Houtz, Carolyn Adams, Becky Shuey, Bill and Deb Lewis, and Dale and Leslie Oxenrider.
“I go wherever I’m needed. We don’t have a specific job,” Jean Shoffler, Tower City, said Wednesday.
“We go where Dale needs us,” Houtz, Muir, said. “We clean the parsley, take the fat from the pork and cut up the sausage,” she said.
Houtz said the work crew is also grateful for the efforts of fellow volunteer, Judy Klinger. She aids the process by bringing the volunteers a home-cooked lunch every day. “We really appreciate that,” Houtz said.
On Wednesday, Klinger had prepared spaghetti for the volunteers. Later in the week, she said she would be making clam chowder.
“I started making lunches because everybody was tired when they’d go home, and they all wanted to know, what are we going to eat?” Klinger, Orwin, said.
Prep work for the operation actually began Sunday, Dale Oxenrider said, with the roasting of 200 pounds of pork shoulder. The pork is put in a refrigerator, and must be cooled before it is added to the other pie filling and broth mixture.
The pies also include 140 pounds of sausage, 700 pounds of potatoes, 50 pounds of onion and added parsley. There’s 2 and 1/2 pounds of filling that is placed in each pie, he said. The meat, produce, pie tins and boxes are all purchased from Schuylkill County firms, making the $12.50 pie truly “local” fare. Although the filling is already cooked, the pies are baked by the customer at home, with the directions for baking marked on the top of each box.
The dough for the pie tops and bottoms is freshly made as well, using a recipe that came along with a recently acquired pie press. A church member, Nancy Geist, bought and donated the pie press for the church about three years ago; and a potato peeler was also bought last November. Previously, volunteers peeled the potatoes by hand.
Leslie Oxenrider suspects the pie origin may have been a Pennsylvania Dutch tradition, and a way to make use of an abundance of previously cooked meats. “I think the pies became very popular here because none of the other churches in the area make this type of pie,” she said.
While most of the funds garnered by the pie sale support the church’s general needs, 10 percent of the funds are set aside for special community donations. Each November, three causes or community organizations are selected to receive the donations, Dale Oxenrider said.
In addition to the pie and food sales, the church also offers a clothing giveaway and a quilting ministry to aid Lutheran World Relief.