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Obligatory holiday photos (you know you want to see them)
Sunday, November 30, 2008 We began by making pie, just like my Grandma Alice and I did when the recipes rolled out of her hands before she call the measurements out to me.
Lil E loves to crank the apple peeler. And he loves to eat the "circle apple" spirals.
I love the apple peeler because it just looks so sweetly ribboned and beautiful.
We rolled out the dough using the recipe my grandmother relied upon. Pillsbury's pre-made dough will pass, she always said, but she always recommended a fabulous, flaky, homemade crust as the preferred foundation for the pie. And really, it's easier than I think it will be every year.
Next, the pie is filled with the apple mixture and generous pats of butter, covered with the top crust, crimped, vented and decorated. Our recipe calls for a cold water brush on the crust to prevent burning and melted butter to glaze and secure the decorative dough. Mine was a daisy-type sunshiney thing.
Bake. Cool. Get anxious to slice into it after dinner. We also baked a little one-cruster for Lil E to share with his dad on Thanksgiving Day.
Look at the meringue on my mom's banana cream pie. So it didn't set up right and it turned out more like banana pudding with pretty topping and crust. No worries. Nobody cared. We just ate it happily with a spoon.
Obligatory table shot. Check out my mama's pumpkin floral centerpiece (go Mom!). Do not look for my sweet potatoes in balsamic reduction. They are in a dish in the sink, passed up in a fit of frustration. We didn't miss them. Nor did we miss the stuffing, which we forgot in the oven. Our plates were that full and we had that much fun...nothing was missed.
The real bird's eye view, courtesy Lil E.
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