Onion Raisin Pie Is the Side Dish My Mom Makes Every Thanksgiving

Most Thanksgiving menus across the United States look more or less the same — you can expect the big bird, some stuffing or dressing, mashed potatoes, a biscuit or a roll. But my family’s Thanksgiving table showcases a side unexpected to all but repeat guests: onion raisin pie. 

The rich, savory pie consists of deeply caramelized onions that are cooked in a heap of butter, sweet dark raisins, and a custardy egg mixture laden with sour cream, all cooked in a flaky piecrust. It’s actually more akin to a quiche than a pie, but bakes without any fussy water bath. 

The origins of onion raisin pie 

Onion raisin pie has been a stalwart on our Thanksgiving table since well before I was born.

My mom, Julia Reidhead, was first introduced to this holiday specialty just outside of Cooperstown in upstate New York. While the town is known best as the home of the Baseball Hall of Fame, it was also where she spent Thanksgiving of 1978 during her freshman year of college. My mom, the youngest of six, traveled with my grandparents from Virginia to see her eldest brother, Paris, who was living in Cooperstown. They were hosted by Paris’ neighbors, George and Lona Smith, and Lona made a pie that would change the trajectory of our family holidays forever. 

George and Lona were farmers from Pennsylvania Dutch origins who made their way to upstate New York, and Lona said onion raisin pie was a popular Pennsylvania Dutch side dish. She sent my mom home with a note card scribbled with the recipe and my mom kept it in her recipe file binder. 

It wasn’t until 1985 that my mom finally made onion raisin pie at her sister Ginny’s house for Thanksgiving. Having not attended the holiday meal at George and Lona’s, Ginny was unfamiliar with the recipe. “There was deep suspicion on the part of my nieces and nephews when I told them what I was making,” my mom recalls. “Even grown adults looked at me quizzically, but I told them they should trust me, and when they tasted it the veil was lifted and they loved it.”

In the 40 years since then, my mom has made onion raisin pie for every Thanksgiving, and only on Thanksgiving. (I help slice onions, but the rest is her show). It’s known as Aunt Julia’s side dish and it has become such an icon of our family that it’s been engraved on a cutting board and printed onto a dishtowel.  

The dish has become a rite of passage for any Thanksgiving newcomers in our family — if you’re joining for the first time, you have to try the pie. And the onion raisin pie gospel has spread far and wide as our family has grown. Our Thanksgiving is so big that it moved from my Aunt Ginny’s living room at her farm outside of Columbus, Ohio, into the barn that we set up with folding tables and chairs and heat with a wood stove. We average around 50 people these days, so we prep many, many onion raisin pies for the meal.  

“People don’t expect to hear the word onion and pie next to each other,” says my mom. The addition of the raisins doesn’t do the name any favors as far as enticing newcomers either. “But the word of mouth in the room is quite positive; I don’t have to say a word about the pie because my nieces and nephews who were once skeptical are now onion raisin pie believers.” 

Tips for making onion raisin pie

Starting your own onion raisin pie tradition is easy. The recipe (see below) has just a handful of ingredients and is simple to prepare. The hardest part is waiting for the onions to caramelize. 

Standard yellow onions sliced into 1/8- to 1/4-inch-thick half-moons work best. Either golden or dark raisins can be used, though the dark raisins offer an attractive color contrast. The onions have to soften and caramelize completely with the butter and raisins before being evenly spread over a par-baked pie crust and topped with a sour cream–egg mixture. Be sure to season both the egg and onion mixtures with salt and pepper before baking until the custard is just set. 

This pie is just as delicious the next day — serve it warm, room temperature, or straight out of the container of leftovers over the sink with a fork. 

Still nervous about the flavor combination in this uncommon side dish? Consider these words of wisdom from my mom: “There’s an enormous amount of butter and sour cream in it anyway, so it’s certainly worth trying.”