Indiana’s Largest Apple Pie: A Sweet Tradition At Mount Zion Church Festival
How about them apples? There's no doubt the Mount Zion Church and Apple Festival gives new meaning to that question each and every year. The beloved (and tasty) southern Indiana festival is held annually the second weekend of October at Honey Creek Farm in Rockport. The highlight of that event- without an apple slice of doubt- is Indiana's Largest Apple Pie!
That pie is crafted and baked by members of the Rockport Masonic Lodge #112.
The pie is massive! Plus, here's a really fun fact. The Rockport Masonic Lodge doesn't bake just one of them. They bake two. They bake one on Friday evening to sell to the crowd on Saturday. Then, they turn right around and bake a second one Saturday night to sell on Sunday.
According to Nikki Winkler (who says the finished product is "pretty darn good"), each pie takes nine bushels of apples. Keeping in mind that one bushel contains between 38 and 42 pounds of apples, that's about 360 pounds of apples in each one. Also, each pie is roughly 8-1/2’ long X 2-1/2’ wide and requires about 25 to 30 pounds of sugar. The pie is so large that is takes about two hours to build and four hours to bake. Each apple is hand-peeled and each pie is hand-built by multiple Masons and Eastern Star members and spouses.
But, how in the heck do you bake an apple pie that's 8-1/2 feet long? Needless to say, it requires an incredibly large oven. Thanks to Jim Ahl, they have one! He custom built this oven specifically for the pie.
You may be wondering how that gigantic pie pan ever makes into that oven. Well, it's mounted on rollers and rolled into it. Once there, the pie bakes until is golden and bubbly.
As you can imagine, the pie is incredibly popular and sells out each day of the festival. You can even get your slice a la mode.