Pi Day, pies and infinite wildflowers

What is wrong with you people? Nothing better to do on 3/14 than noodle around the Web and search for Pi Day?

The San Francisco Exploratorium claims to be the creator of Pi Day, an “international geek holiday” it started 20 years ago to celebrate the mathematical ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter known as Pi — 3.1415926535…and on and on and on.

Today’s activities include Ask a Scientist’s Pi Day Puzzles, a Pi Procession and — what else — a serving of pie (not the number, the real deal).

That got us thinking more about pie than Pi. So we called the Julian Pie Co. in tiny Julian, California, where the Smothers family has been churning out apple pies since 1986.

“I’ve never had anybody say, ‘I’m here today because of Pi Day,’ ” said Dave Smothers, manager of the shop that made Julian synonymous with apple pies. (Yes, we felt silly asking.)

But Dave did tell us that there is a pie boom on in Julian right now that’s tied to wildflower blooms, not mathematical equations.

Last week when word got out that the wildflowers are putting on a spectacular show in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, business doubled at the Smothers’ shop in the town right on California 79.

“It’s a huge attraction, and you have to drive through Julian to get to Anza-Borrego,” Dave said. Tour buses, families, random visitors all stop, he says, to have a slice of pie. The most popular? Dutch apple.

If you want your own slice of heaven to celebrate Pi Day, you can order a Julian pie for $14.95 (add a dollar if your choice is pecan), plus the cost of shipping it to your door.

Then cut the pie into 3.14-inch wedges. Wait, that only works with circles…hey, you do the math.

— Mary Forgione, Los Angeles Times staff writer

[Image: San Francisco Exploratorium]

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This entry was posted on Friday, March 14, 2008 at 1:15 pm by Mary Forgione and is filed under California, Family & Kids, Outdoors & Adventure, Spring. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.