Autumn Desserts with Stacey Mei Yan Fong

We’re excited to welcome baker and cookbook author extraordinaire Stacey Mei Yan Fong aboard the Schooner American Eagle this fall for a trip all about baking!

Stacey is an IACP award winning baker and author living in Brooklyn, NY. She was born in Singapore, lived in Indonesia, grew up in Hong Kong, and moved to the States to pursue a degree from the Savannah College of Art and Design. She spent a decade designing in the fashion industry, and during that time she launched her "50 Pies 50 States" project which led to her slinging pies at Four and Twenty Blackbirds Pie Shop. Her work has been featured by Good Morning America, NPR, CBS Sunday Morning, The James Beard Foundation, America’s Test Kitchen, Eater, and beyond. 

Meeting Stacey was pure happenstance. After spotting her book 50 Pies 50 States in a bookstore, former mess mate Nate was intrigued by her signature Maine pie, wild blueberry with a Moxie reduction, complete with a lobster-painted pie crust.

Through the power of social media Stacey joined us for a trip in 2024. Over four days we had a blast baking pie and honing our skills, so much fun in fact that we decided to devote a whole trip to baking aboard the American Eagle.

Baking aboard the Eagle is a unique experience, starting with our classic Shipmate wood-fired stove. Located in the same location as the original, it is the heart of the galley. While baking on a wood stove is not as easy as a home oven, the dry heat and cast iron make for crispy crust on bread and golden shining pies. In addition to the wood stove, baking while sailing presents new challenges. Have you every tried baking while everything is leaning 10 degrees port, or what happens when you tack and everything slides to the other side of the schooner?

Wild Maine blueberry pie, complete with moxie reduction and lobster-adorned crust

Stacey’s trip, Autumn Desserts is an opportunity to get hands-on and learn how to improve pie baking and recipe writing skills. Our itinerary for the trip includes more formal learning such as a demo on making pie dough from scratch (all-butter is our preferred recipe), learning how to crimp like a pro, and staging and taking beautiful food photography. In addition there will be time to chat about what its like to develop recipes and create a cookbook. To commemorate the trip every guest will receive a tote complete with baking tools, ingredient vouchers, and a Schooner American Eagle apron.