By Elizabeth Fechter
Murphy News Service
The first snowfall of the season wasn’t enough to stop Power, Corruption & Pies from taking over Hola Arepa restaurant Monday afternoon for their pop-up pie shop.
Michelle Gayer, of Salty Tart bakery in Minneapolis, will continue to host her pop-up pie shop every Monday throughout the month of November, and most-likely December, at 3 p.m.
“We’ve been wanting to do a pie project for awhile,” Gayer said, who has been in the business for 25 years. “We had no space, and if we did a pop-up we’d get our needs met. Our needs to make pie.”
Hola Arepa is closed Mondays, so Gayer thought it would be a perfect spot to set up shop.
“We’re friends, we eat here a lot. We like their food, what they do, their business model…their food,” Gayer said with a chuckle.
“They were a little food truck once upon a time, and we were a little bakery once upon a time. We’re still the same little bakery, just have a lot more humans to make a lot more stuff.”
Power, Corruptions & Pie had its debut Monday, Nov. 4. They sold out in 90 minutes.
“We made more pies this week, 60 last week and 160 this week,” Gayer said.
Upon arrival to Power, Corruption & Pies, guests are greeted with a pie baby, a sampling of one of the pies available for purchase, and a cocktail.
This week, caramel apple pie babies and boulevardiers were handed out to quickly warm guests up from the cold.
Each week there will be four seasonal pies available for purchase, along with a savory and sweet hand pie. This week on the menu was a malted banana cream pie, a cranberry pear pie, a caramel apple pie and a chocolate cream pie. Hand pies included an apple version, as well as a potato, caramelized onion and cheese variety.
Full pies cost $25, and hand pies cost $4.
Salty Tart bakery is open seven days a week at the Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis. The little bakery, as Gayer calls it, opened with three employees and now has 12.
Gayer has been nominated for the James Beard award recognizing outstanding pastry chefs on more than one occasion, and was named “Best Pastry Chef” by Bon Appétit magazine in 2012.
Power, Pie & Corruptions is located at 3501 Nicollet Avenue, every Monday at 3 p.m. throughout the month of November, and hopefully December. Find out more here.
Reporter Elizabeth Fechter is studying journalism at the University of Minnesota.