Padma Lakshmi says apple pie is not American

If Don McLean ever updates American Pie, he may have to sneak in a small footnote now, because this week Padma Lakshmi reignited a debate that has appeared before: the simple, factual claim that apple pie is not originally American. The remark, which she made again in a recent interview promoting her new cooking show, set off a round of online reactions that ranged from mild irritation to full-blown cultural outrage. But the actual history behind her statement is neither controversial nor new. Lakshmi first made the claim several years ago during a 2020 interview about American food culture. She repeated the point this week, emphasising that the ingredients and the idea of apple pie are all imports from other parts of the world. The renewed statement caught more attention this tim