“Shirley Fout Miller was a walking medical miracle.”
So opens her 2012 obituary in the Hagerstown Herald-Mail. “She contracted tuberculosis at age 12 from her mother… Shirley was not expected to live more than a few months.”
As an adult, she twice survived breast cancer and tuberculosis resurgence. Her daughter Holly Miller said, “She’s been cheating death for 75 years.”
Shirley spent many years being ill. Unable to participate in a lot of typical childhood and teenage activities, she turned to another outlet: art.
Shirley Fout Miller may not be a household name, but she left an admirable body of artwork celebrating regional and historic sites, including a calendar of sketches of Colonial Williamsburg, and prints of local sights in her hometown of Hagerstown.
Miller’s obituary portrays a colorful and vivacious character. “She wanted to live in the kind of society of Edith Wharton and Jane Eyre,” Miller’s partner said.
“My mother was the queen of entertaining,” Shirley’s daughter Holly recalled. The obituary declared Miller’s life to have been filled with “style, entertaining and Chardonnay,” and invitations for guests to dine at a “beautiful table set with china, silver, flowers, and hand-painted place-cards.”
Shirley’s oldest son Barrick Miller said “She had such a zest for life. It came from the sanatorium, being a bystander in life for more than a decade. She had to figure out how to use this life that she didn’t expect to have.”
I had to figure out how to use some beef stock I didn’t expect to have, and I thought it a good opportunity to make a Pennsylvania-Dutch-influenced favorite, Slippery Pot Pie.
Many churches in the Hagerstown area make the dish as a fundraiser. A friend of mine who grew up there remembers it being served in the school cafeteria.
Despite the name, Slippery Pot Pie is not served in a crust. It is instead a variation on Slippery Dumplings, Chicken n’ Dumplings, or “Slick” Dumplings. Dumplings rolled out and cooked in a stew broth help to spread the ingredients further, creating a perfect hearty meal for a chilly evening.
Slippery Pot Pie is comfort food. I did not grow up eating this and yet I was somehow comforted by the feeling of biting into a dumpling, the rich gravy flavor, and the tender meat and veggies.
Chicken & Dumplings is the most common and famous version of this dish, but Slippery Pot Pie can also be a vehicle for other meats or even beans. A 2018 article in the Hagerstown Herald-Mail quoted Sharon Haines: “There is chicken, ham, bean, beef, squirrel — yes, dove, and more. It all depends on who you talk to and who makes what. But it’s good.” Ham and turkey are particularly popular at fund-raiser suppers.
Many longtime makers of Slippery Pot Pie disavow recipes. “I never knew a recipe,” Bobbie McBride told the Washington Post in 2002.
Despite the lack of recipes, I found some predictably passionate declarations online. One person balked at using water in the dumpling dough, declaring that you must use some of the broth for added flavor. Others debated the necessary thinness of the noodles. Some younger people, perhaps exposed to one too many church suppers, expressed disdain for the dish.
Despite the detractors, Slippery Pot Pie events have no trouble finding people to line up for a taste. Since the arrival of COVID, some churches have orchestrated takeout sales.
I don’t know if Shirley Fout Miller served her recipe to guests eating off that fine china and silver. For many, the homeyness of Slippery Pot Pie is inelegant fare, something you order up at a diner. Maybe Shirley herself had been served bowls of Slippery Pot Pie as a sickly child, in hopes it would restore her health like proverbial chicken soup. And maybe it did. One way or another, Miller lived a long life of prayer, art, friends, flowers, and good home cooking.
Recipe:
- beef, cut up (leftover)
- 2 Quarts Water (less if you have leftover gravy or broth)
- 1 onion
- carrots (optional)
- 1.5 Cups all-purpose flour
- 1 Tablespoon salt
- 1 Teaspoon bacon grease, lard, or Crisco
- enough cold water to make a stiff batter
“Knead. Roll very thin. Cut in strips. Set aside. About 20 minutes before the potatoes are done, slip dough into boiling pot making sure it goes into the liquid. Hence the name, Slippery Pot Pie.”
Recipe from Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread, St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, 1969.
