CHECK IT OUT:Find your piece of the pie

Pecan pie, blueberry pie, peach pie, cherry pie. Pie is the ultimate comfort food. We read about it, sing about it, eat it, bake it, see movies about it and travel to find it.

Astronomer Carl Sagan once said, “If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe.” No need to go that far; it’s all at your library and easy as pie.

“Four Tops: 50th Anniversary Collection” on DVD, by The Four Tops. Remember the song, “I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)”? This brand-new DVD features the Four Tops singing their most popular songs in concert, with guests such as Aretha Franklin and Mary Wilson. Invite friends over for some pie and a sing-along.

The ultimate yummy pie recipe book, “The Pie and Pastry Bible” by Rose Levy Beranbaum, with illustrations by Laura Hartman Maestro and photographs by Gentl and Hyers, will have your mouth watering just by looking at the pictures. Beranbaum demonstrates pie pastry shells with flaky crusts and flavorful fillings for the culinary inclined.

In “Key Lime Pie Murder: A Hannah Swenson Mystery with Recipes” by Joanne Fluke, the mystery-solving heroine Hannah Swenson discovers a dead body along with a smashed key lime pie when asked to judge a baking contest at the town fair. Treat yourself to real pie recipes and feed your appetite for fiction with this 2007 title. Hannah also solves more pie mysteries in the “Lemon Meringue Pie Murder.”

County music has always extolled the virtues of pie. Hear Kenny Chesney sing about key lime pie in the excellent sound recording on CD “Be As You Are: Songs From an Old Blue Chair.”

“Seinfeld: Season 5” on DVD features unforgettable episodes, such as “The Puffy Shirt” — and “The Pie.”

“American Pie: Slices of Life (and Pie) from America’s Back Roads” by Pascale LeDraolec. Is this a travel book with recipes for cooking or a cookbook for the armchair traveler? Whichever you prefer, join the author in an adventure of exploration focusing on our collective food habits, including the search for the best pies in the United States.

As American as apple pie, “Miss American Pie: A Diary of Love, Secrets, and Growing Up in the 1970s” by Margaret Sartor is a Southern girl’s biography recounting her experiences from ages 12 to 18 through letters, diaries and notebooks. These Louisiana memoirs are newly published.

“American Pie: My Search for the Perfect Pizza” by Peter Reinhart pays tribute to pizza — the other pie! Join the author on a trip through Italy and the United States to find the ultimate pizza pie.

So you’ve eaten pie, traveled to find pie, sung about pie and saw movies with pie. But what do you do with the leftover pie pans?

“Pie Pan Mania” by Christine M. Irvin tells you how to recycle your pie tins in craft projects that kids will love. Turn them into party hats, wind chimes and other crafts that are fun to make.

is written by Newport Beach Public Library reference librarian Mary Ellen Bowman. Use your Newport Beach Public Library card to reserve these titles at www.newportbeachlibrary. org or call (949) 717-3800 and press 2.