UW student marries dessert & delivery with "Piecycle" | Arts & Culture

If pie is the new cupcake, then UW student Max Kraushaar might be the next big thing since Cool Whip.

Kraushaar, an arts and theater major, has invented a home delivery service of the pies he makes each night by hand. The 22-year old Lynnwood native rides his bike around town delivering the pies every weekend under the inventive title, the Piecycle.

"It’s kind of exploded lately," said Kraushaar, when we reached him by phone Friday afternoon, as he was cooking up a toffee marshmallow pie. "Right now everything is me. I bake them and I bike them."

Kraushaar came up with the idea at a dinner party he attended last September. The UW student says he was late to the party, and it was his job to bring dessert, so he jerry-rigged his bike to carry some fresh-made pie. Out of the invention, a conversation with a friend, and too many glasses of wine, the Piecycle was born.

What began with a flyer drop in the UW dorms has since exploded into the Piecycle phenomenon. “Last week I had more demand than I had pies, and that was really stressful," Kraushaar said. "The demand… I mean, I’m just one guy.”

The budding baker makes all his pies by hand froms scratch, using recipes from friends or from his time working at the now-closed Curio Confections (which used to be in the U-District). Kraushaar offers late-night pie delivery on Fridays and Saturdays from 6 pm - 3 am for $3 a slice or $20 for the whole pie. He prefers the orders to be filed via text message.

This weekend he's serving up both a toffee marshmallow pie ("kind of like a sticky toffee pudding," he says) and a vegan pear pie with candied ginger. He makes about 15-20 deliveries each weekend night on his custom-built single speed bike (with a basket).

All this, while working on his two degrees at UDub. Plus, Seattle's bicycle-riding mayor just started following on him on Twitter.

That, pie fans, is something to stick a fork into.

Track the Piecycle on its Twitter page or follow Kraushaar on Facebook.