Who Are the Purple Hat Scribes?
     The Scribes met on March 4, 2006 to taste-test the very first Moon Butter Pies. The Scribes are creative writers who wear purple hats. Below are writings concerning Moon Butter Pie and other dreamy desserts. Members have given permission for their work to be published here.

What is Moon Butter Pie?
    We suggest you read the humorous novel The Moon Butter Route by Max Yoho to find its origins.
    AND...the public tried the pie, savory with whisky and butter, on Saturday, April 1, 2006 at the Electric Cat Cafe in Paxico, Kansas. That day Max spoke of bootlegging in Southeast Kansas and read from his novel.

Moon Butter Pie Lives On
by Linda Geffert

Blinding, jagged lightening split the tumbling muddy skies while banshees
wailed, foretelling impending death. And I fought violently tearing at the
black cloud fingers clutching my throat, lying in the sweat soaked bed,
unable to breathe, unable to scream, unable to break free from the torturous
nightmare. Oh, please! Just stop the banshees from howling, moaning,
yodeling! Yodeling? Could it be? Is that Jimmy Rodgers' Blue Yodel? In the
key of E flat?

From the murky depth of my nightmare a large woman appeared, walking
right toward me, strumming a Harmony guitar and squeezing all the piss and
vinegar out of that old country song.

She stopped, laughed a big laugh, and said, "My, that felt good. It's been a
long time since I departed these mortal remains. Never thought it would be so much fun to dust off the old body and give it another run."

"Are you," I stammered, "Ruby Strang?

"'l am" she answered, "in the flesh, at least for a few minutes." More wild laughter. "And you are the pie baker."

"Well, yes, l am. But what is going on? Are you here visiting from heaven?"

With that, Ruby's laugh and voluptuous body took on vibrations that probably would have measured a seven on the Richter Scale, had we been in a reality which measured earthquakes.

"No, there's no such things as heaven—or hell, for that matter. It's just spaces where like-minded spirits hang out together. The space I'm in is filled with writers, artists, creative people and story tellers. We were just ordinary working folks who had a zest for living. You know, maybe that is heaven.

"Anyway, we were playing poker and a man named Max Yoho came into the conversation. Say, we like his style!! As the bidding started getting wild, which is rather amusing since we play with moon dust and there's an unlimited supply of the stuff, someone asked if I ever passed on my recipe for Moon Butter Pie. Well, it hit me like a ton of 'Don't Spit On The Sidewalk' bricks! I had NOT. So, we looked around for a fair to midlin' pie maker and found you. Write this down because I am here to pass on the biggest secret of my earthly life, the recipe for Moon Butter Pie."

I leaned toward her, absorbing each word. In the middle of the recipe, thunder shook the ground and lightening made our hair stand on end. "Just a minute," Ruby yelled to the sky, "we're almost finished." She chuckled, "That was probably Booger Red or my old watch crow. They are the dangdest, most impatient poker players up there, probably wanting to start a new game."

Ruby finished sharing her secret recipe. "Now use it wisely and be careful of its power. It's very potent, you know." With that she turned on her heel and started back into that wild cacophony of sound and color.

"Wait," I yelled! "What's happening? How can this be? You're not real! You
are a fictitious character living in the head of Max Yoho."

With that comment, and before she disappeared, Ruby let loose with a little
burst of a yodel, in the key of G, and offered these parting remarks. "Fictitious?" she exclaimed, "Really! Tell me, are you going to make that pie?"

"Yes," I answered.

"And eat it?"

"Yes," I again replied.

"Isn't that a most interesting thing about reality and fiction, about writers
creating fiction, or thinking they're creating fiction? Sort of like the chicken
and the egg—which came first? Was I really born in Max's mind, or was I
already a reality and just needed him to find me? Makes you wonder, now
don't it?"

Yes, Ruby, it makes you wonder.

— © 2006 by Linda Geffert

Whenever Linda and Janice put out their welcome mat
You don’t want to miss the excitement that
Is generated by the master baker from the Electric Cat
And her partner in crime in the purple hat.

Now, I don’t claim to know any fancy highfalutin poet talk,
But I do know good pie when I taste it or it hits me on the block,
So put your money where your mouth is, talk the talk and walk the walk,
Get yourself on over to the house on High and give that door a knock.

You might think we’d be considered strange and eccentric,
But with all honesty and modesty, I tell you we are electric!
We may get a little carried away with our stories and wax poetic,
But we’re pretty sharp cookies and we don’t miss a trick.

There we’ll be awaiting to offer you the wonderful, glorious cure
For everything that ails you and all the troubles you endure.
Request a second helping to be absolutely sure
That the world is getting better and your sainted soul is pure.

Bring along a high-toned song or a story or a poem to mystify.
You read it right out loud now, don’t you be shy.
Just good food, good clean fun, and tongue-in-cheek writing by
A bunch of purple-hatted people eating words with their pie.

And not just any common ordinary pie, mind you,
But pie that would make St. Peter leave the pearly gate, the kind you
Think you must be dreaming when you taste it, but you find you
Have really died and gone to heaven and left God’s green earth behind you.

When all is said and done, and that pie has disappeared in the blink of an eye,
You’ll have a heavy load lifted off your heart and your spirit will fly.
No one will divulge the secret recipe no matter how hard you try,
But you’ll be fat and pure-and-tee in love with Moon Butter Pie.

— © 2006 by Karen Sells Brown

Dolly’s Dessert 
by Anne McCourtie

The ingredients are simple,
Making them is fun.

Dolly just loves it,
When I make her some.

I’ll mix them up thick
So the edges won’t run.

Then pour them out easy
Shaped like a bun.

Rounded and brown
And baked by the sun.

It’s easy to tell when
Mud pies are done.

— © 2006 by Anne McCourtie

— © 2006 by Janice Levering

Moon Butter Pie
by Evie Green

Moon butter pie sounds so fine
And Max Yoho's book is divine.
    Oooo, Linda's "Moon Butter Pie"
    I would just love to try
But reluctantly I must decline!

Oooo, scrumptious Moon Butter Pie
But if it has whiskey and rye
    I'll have to say, "No"
    Or my sobriety will go
'Cause for twenty-two years, I've been dry!

That wonderful Moon Butter Booze
From epic townspeople's pores it did ooze1
    Oh! I wish I had some
    But I just can't...Dadgum!
So into another dull, sober year, I'll cruise!

— © 2006 by Evie Green

The Inaugural Tasting Party
of Moon Butter Pie
by Barbara Lerma

Moon Butter Pie! What was Max thinking?

Was he remembering Moon Pies with RC

That you would drink from a green-tinted glass bottle

Back in the day?

No, that couldn't be it, because Moon Butter Pie

Is sooo much better than that.

Besides, Moon Pies don't have any whiskey

In them, as far as I know.

And it wouldn't be against the law to transport Moon Pies

In the panel van around Southeast Kansas.

But Moon Butter Pie, now, that's a different story.

Moon Butter Pie must have some Moon Butter rot gut

With a drop of Blind Sorrow. Yes, that's

Got to be it! 

Trudy tasted the Moon Butter Pie and exclaimed

"Cheesecake with rum! That's what it is!"

But Linda wasn't talking because

Moon Butter Pie is a secret recipe

That she bakes on special days

At the Electric Cat Café.

— © 2006 by Barbara Lerma