Harvard's Own: The Cambridge Cream

Three times a week, for years, I used to meet my father after school to do my homework. We would meet at his office at Yale and then go to Naples, the local college restaurant and hangout, to eat a snack and study.

The most memorable of those rendezvous were held over Boston Cream Pie, without a doubt the human creation closest to the food of the gods. It has everything: Delicate, delicious, yellow cake, a creamy, custard filling, and chocolate all over its top.

One would think that to attend college in the Boston area would be to suffer never again from Boston Cream Pie withdrawal. Yet try as I might, I have not found one restaurant in Boston or Cambridge that serves a single slice of Boston cream pie.

From Legal Sea Foods to Anthony's Pier Four to Boston's famous Durgin-Park, even the best known area restaurants come up short. One would think that, at least out of nostalgia, some Boston restaurant would serve Boston cream pie. Alas, the only place I have found it is at Harvard.

Harvard Dining Services also offers London Broil, Italian Sausage and several other geographically correct foods--even the less-well-known Kansas Medley Vegetables. One can sample the world's native fare without leaving the dining hall.

Harvard's is good Boston Cream Pie, too. I usually load up with at least two pieces. Maybe that's just because I know I won't see it around anywhere else I look.

I've spied metal pie tins in the dining hall trash after Boston cream pie meals. I think that means Harvard doesn't make its own pie, but purchases it elsewhere. Harvard buys a lot--enough to serve several thousand students--so there must be a big Boston cream pie factory somewhere.

I haven't found it yet. Perhaps it's underground. I wonder where.