The Pecan Tree (Corrie Herring Hooks Series) Hardcover - 1994

From the publisher

Travel anywhere in the southern United States, and you will find pecan trees. So popular are pecans that Thomas Jefferson once wrote home from Paris for a supply, while many people today consider their holidays incomplete without a pecan pie. This inviting book explores the natural history, cultivation, and uses of the pecan tree for a general readership. Jane Manaster pieces together a fascinating mosaic of the peoples caught up in the pecan story--Native Americans, Spanish explorers, European immigrants and their American descendants, African-Americans, and Mexican-Americans. Manaster also describes the natural history of the pecan tree, including its life cycle, the development of many cultivated species, and predators and diseases of the pecan. She chronicles growers' successes in extending the pecan's original range eastward from the Mississippi basin to Florida and westward to California. And she charts the growth of the commercial pecan industry, especially in Georgia, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Not forgetting the pecan's popularity in candy and baked goods, Manaster includes over twenty traditional and modern recipes for such delights as pralines, candied pecans, pecan pie, and pecan logs. With such a wealth of information in so readable a format, The Pecan Tree will find a wide audience among pecan lovers and growers everywhere.