Meanings
plural shoofly pies · alternative shoo-fly pie
- countableuncountableA fluffy pie made from molasses with a crumb cake top, traditional among the Pennsylvania Dutch.
“Greetings. My name is Ruby Zeldastein. I'm a medium to the other side, and I make a hell of a shoofly pie.”
2013 October 6, Matt McKenna, “Poltergasm” (7:58 from the start), in American Dad!, season 10, episode 2, spoken by Roger (Seth MacFarlane)1 more example
Shoo-Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy / Make your eyes light up / Your tummy say, "Howdy." / Shoo-Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy / I never get enough of that wonderful stuff.
1945, “Shoo-Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy”, Sammy Gallop (music)Synonyms: shoofly cake
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA fluffy pie made from molasses with a crumb cake top, traditional among the Pennsylvania Dutch.
Origin
From shoo + fly + pie. Named after the Shoofly molasses company, which was named after "Shoofly the Boxing Mule" (a circus attraction of the period), which was named after a Civil-War-era folk song called "Shoo Fly, Don't Bother Me". Not related to the idea of shooing flies away from the sweet filling.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
shoofly pie. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shoofly%20pie
“shoofly pie.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shoofly%20pie. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “shoofly pie,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/shoofly%20pie.
Source: shoofly pie on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.