Around the Kitchen Table - Thanksgiving Pie Recipes

Hi everyone, I'm Chef Dennis Littley and welcome to Around the Kitchen Table. And we're here today with holiday pies, Thanksgiving Day pies. And I say holiday because a lot of these you could use for Christmas as well, or the winter season. They're just really, really good pies. And you know, everybody loves pie. About the only thing you don't see other than this time of year is pumpkin. But we're going to do a pecan pie today, which is great any time of year, and an apple cranberry pie with a crumble topping. Any of those are good all the time. Susan, you're in your new house. How are things going?

Yeah, bring on those pies. Just bring them on. I think we're all ready. We've waited long enough. Just bring them on. Yeah, so I did. I moved last Thursday and I'm in my new office. There's a little bit of an echo because I guess I haven't filled it up yet, but you can see behind me I have a fireplace.

I can't wait to see that burning sometime when we're on.

Oh, it will be. Next week it will be for sure. So we're here, we're on, we have a view of the harbor, which is so beautiful. It's our dream. And you know, I'm going to get in shape so I can cook everything you make because we have 2s in this house. So I can do it. I can eat whatever you make. So it was a weekend of— we didn't go crazy unpacking. It's like cooking. Do it at a pace you're comfortable with. And we just kind of went back and forth between enjoying the house and a little bit of unpacking here and there. So that's my weekend, and, you know, probably ate food we shouldn't have eaten, although I did make a healthy meal one night. So how about you? How are you doing? How was your weekend?

My weekend was good. I just really— I had planned on going to a conference, and I just wasn't feeling it, so I just didn't drive that far. No excuse. I just wanted a me day. Lisa was in Philadelphia, and And usually I don't do— I like to go to Barnes Noble, get a cup of coffee and sit down for a couple hours and just read magazines and things. You know, it's— I don't do it very often because it just seems like a luxury. Even retired, it seems like a luxury to do something like that. And then I went to The Container Store. I was so excited because Lisa hates that place.

You're kidding. Oh god. Oh, I love that place. I mean, I used to do, you know, the Tupperware parties. I used to buy everything. So what did you find there?

Well, I got all my jars there. If you look behind me, you'll see a whole set of jars, and I don't know if they're staying there. They may go elsewhere, but I bought these, and I had two of these jars from— for about 15 years that I keep my coffee in, and I finally got new lids for them so they look better. But other than that, the jars held up great. So I got these, and I have all like pumpkin seeds, chia seeds, quinoa, almonds, all kinds of neat, healthy things. That's nice. Moving into the healthier realm of cooking.

Yeah, and you know what? That's certainly where we will be headed after the first of the year, right?

Yeah, I mean, we were talking about it. I'm gluten-free now, and it's definitely not as difficult as I had anticipated it would be. I feel better. It's It's been amazing. I don't think I expected the type of results I was getting. The first thing was that I felt like a fog had been lifted over me after about a week. Everybody that's gluten-free laughs when I say that and go, "Yeah, go figure." Everyone knows that that is gluten-free. It's like a big secret. Stop eating it, and you're going to think clearer. It lifts your brain. It just makes you more alert. I don't need as much sleep. I'm not tired in the middle of the day. The other thing was, you know how my back bothers me a lot? Well, guess what stopped bothering me as much?

You're kidding.

I'm not eating all that inflammatory white flour.

See, I don't know the science behind it. I am not gluten-free. I don't know anything about it, and I would love to talk about it more., you know, in more depth after the first of the year. Because, you know, me not knowing, maybe there are other people like me who don't know about it. But that's, that's amazing. That's like a miracle.

You know, that was it. Oh, and Aslan is asking, are they Kilner jars? No, they're— Aslan, they are from Sicily. And they are from— the name again, as I always pronounce it— Bormioli Rocco. From Sicily, quattro stagioni. And they come in all sizes. These were $3.99, as were the bigger ones, this size. And I almost got all this size, and I went, oh, they're getting a little too big for some things. So I only got a couple of those, but I got 8 of these. I was going to buy them on Amazon, but they were more expensive than at The Container Store. I figured, well, half of them are going to come broken anyway, so I might as well, you just make the trip.

I love the way those jars are displayed in the kitchen, in any kitchen. It adds such beautiful color and texture, and it just makes you— I think it inspires you to be healthier because you can see all these healthy ingredients.

You know what else? It inspires you to use them because they're right there. Yeah. The other thing, and I started to buy lightly— the ones that were already roasted and salted and some of the seeds and things. I looked at them, and they were using canola They were using some other process. These are just seeds. There should not be that many ingredients. I figured, let me bite the bullet, and I'll just roast them myself. I was just being lazy doing it that way. I wanted to make some gluten-free energy bars because the ones I've been buying have been okay, but they're expensive, too.

Yes. Oh, that's— what happened?

Thunder.

Oh, no. That I would really be excited about, too, doing these protein bars because they're good for you. And you know what? Anything that curbs hunger in between meals, I think it adds necessary fuel to your system, and it keeps you from straying to foods that aren't so great. Do you think so?

Yeah, I believe that. And I went to a new doctor, Gene Layton. Who is a friend of mine, is a naturopathic physician. I found one in the area, and first thing she said when I was explaining things, she goes, "You might be low blood sugar at times. Your blood sugar is spiking too low." I started keeping these little bars in the car with me because that's always the time it hits you. You end up eating junk because you have to eat something. When I start to feel this, I'll eat that, and that'll hold me until I get somewhere where I can get something better.

Yeah, so we need to definitely need a variety of those. Definitely. So, but, but we're not there yet. I mean, we're in the holiday season.

That's right.

Come on, you know, we have permission, right?

And there's ways to eat some things. And again, it's always about moderation. All right. And like with these pies, two of them are going to go right to school with Lisa, and I'm sure her fellow teachers will enjoy them. I'm going to keep the apple one here because apple is my favorite. Favorite. I can live without the others, although I like a slice, but I'll stay with just one. But I did buy some pre-made shells because it's not about reinventing the wheel, making yourself crazy, and just really— you don't have to do that much. Thanksgiving's going to be a very stressful, busy time. Making a pie, making the filling is good. The crust Honestly, unless you're really slaving over it, and if it's a two-crust pie, that's when the crust really makes a difference. These are only just bottom crust pies, and a lot of times people don't eat the bottom anyway. They'll eat around it. They'll eat the filling. Using pre-bought, I don't think is a big deal for this. I actually did buy some gluten-free pie shells, so we're going to see how they are.

Okay, cool. This sounds good. Let's get to it.

Let's get on the road then. What we're going to start with is we're going to start with a pecan pie. So let me switch cameras. All right, this one. And what we're going to do is we're going to very first, we want to start with 5 large eggs. And I've had these out so they're, um, come to room temperature. But I'm going to whip these eggs up, and they are organic pastured eggs.

So now, organic pastured— pasteurized eggs? Pastured.

That means pasture-raised, because a lot of times The whole trick with it saying cage-free, or it means that they have a little door in where they're kept and they can go in and out if they want to, or they're taken outside for 5 minutes and brought back. It's a very loosely used term, but when you say pastured, pastured means that they're actually raised the way it would be natural for them to be raised outside. So in terms of pasture, you have pastured chicken, pastured beef, pork, or eggs from the chicken. So that means that it is really done the way it was supposed to be done.

Now my daughter buys eggs at the farmer's market and organic, some type of organic, and they tell her she can leave them out at room temperature and they will last for a few weeks. Is Is that the same? Do you think that's the same type of—

I don't know for sure. I know that a wholesome egg is a lot easier to take care of than some of these eggs that are mass-produced, where the chickens are on all kinds of things, and they're basically crazy, too. But I wouldn't be able to answer that completely. I know when you Europe, you don't have to refrigerate them.

Yeah, so that may be what she's talking about because that is what the egg person told her. You know, and the other thing is, look, you know, when you're— it's nice to make pies, but it's also good to delegate. Sometimes, you know, people are asking what to bring or what they can bring, you know, you can always delegate it too. You know, you don't have to make 3 pies. No.

You know, you're going somewhere and you want to make the pies, you know, this would be a nice way to show them that you care. And so what I did was I whipped up the eggs, and they don't quite have to be this frothy, but I did get a nice froth on them. So I did that. Now we're just going to start putting other ingredients in, and we've got a light corn syrup. And I know some people are probably cringing at that, and I really haven't come up with something else to use. I know some of my healthy bloggers probably will have some input on what to use instead of corn syrup.

Well, isn't the function of the corn syrup, particularly for pecan pie, to— isn't it like a binder?

It's a binder, yeah. It's holding everything together. Yeah, but I don't know what other, what other type of sweetener or syrup. I mean, maple syrup isn't thick enough, so I don't think— I don't know if that would work as well or not. It might.

I wonder if something with cornstarch, some type of, you know, cornstarch.

Things like cornstarch, you change— you're changing a lot of what you're doing. So I'm putting in the different sugars now. Okay, so I've added in some brown sugar, and I'll put these recipes all up too on the post when we do do this. So there was a little salt in the white sugar, and now I've got some vanilla and some bourbon because this is a pecan pie, so it's a bourbon pecan pie. And we also have a little bit of melted butter, and I had to put the rest of it in there because it had solidened up on me. So we're just going to mix this back together. Okay. And get this blended in really well.

And you know, the other part, the other part of delegating the pies, I know from my experience is that you want to be careful who you delegate to.

Yes.

Sometimes I have delegated to a family member who brought, you know, the supermarket box, you know, pie The supermarket box pie, which, you know, you can have every day. And I mean, yeah, I am a snob. Yes, I am a snob about pies and Thanksgiving. And I think that's the time to be it. So be careful who you delegate to.

That's true. And some of them, there are some places you can get some really good pies. But for the most part, if you're just walking in and buying one from Acme or something off the shelf, it's a great everyday pie. But it's not that special occasion pie. You know, honestly, Just get a Mrs. Smith's pie or one of those really good deep dish Marie Callender. Brush it with egg, raw sugar, that real thick granulated on it, and then—

Oh yeah.

Thank you. Baked it. I mean, they're good pies. So I've got everything mixed in here now. I've got the eggs whipped. I've got brown sugar, white sugar, a little salt, some butter, some vanilla, and some bourbon. So this is going to make the base, and the eggs are really what's going to gel this together and make it a rich a rich base. So now I'm going to put in 2 cups of chopped pecans. And this is basically—

so, so no, not putting any spices, I see, in there.

No, a little bit of salt. It's going to have— we're going to have a little hint from the bourbon. There was a nice shot of bourbon in there. And really what you're going to taste is you're going to taste You know how that pecan sort of sets. I don't think cinnamon— I mean, you could always play with spices if there's something you like, but I don't know if that's really the way you'd want to go with it. So this is the pie, and this is the shell. So what we're going to do is we're just going to start, and I'm not sure how full this is going to make it, so I'm being careful. I have not made this recipe.

Yeah, that doesn't look I would expect for pecan pies.

Okay. Interesting. And now what you can do is you can take whole pecans, you can kind of place them.

But I don't get— you know, I'm always expecting that dark brown color.

Well, you know, it's going to cook to the center.

Yeah.

And then you want to make sure that the center— one of the easiest ways to tell if it's done is if you have a thermometer, you want to check it and see if you get 200 degrees in the center. Otherwise, you have to kind of take a chance, and if it springs back, kind of a thing.

Now, that's one by one pecan. Now, that's a good job for an assistant.

Yes, absolutely. Yeah, more than likely even a child with— adult that's not been drinking.

So yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, I mean, you know, if people want to get back at you for something, you know, that's the place to do it. That's the place to do it.

Bell things out on it with pecans and then put it in the oven.

Yeah, yeah, my family would do that totally.

But anyway, I mean, this is just— I mean, you can go all the way and fill it. You can just do the edge like this. You could also just bake it And I think the last time I made a pecan pie, I made a little chocolate ganache and I covered the top with chocolate ganache, and that was pretty cool.

Nice. Now, you know, I'm also thinking, I mean, can you even add something with cherries or raspberries?

You can put anything you want on it. I mean, any combination that you think is going to be good. With pecans is definitely going to work. Cherries sound really good to me with pecans. You know, anything kind of fruity and nutty always goes together, like fruit of the forest type stuff. So that's that. So I'm going to—

Wow, that was it! That's short, huh?

That's fast. I mean, I'm telling you, that's a pecan pie. And when you're not making the crust, that's saving you because really the crust is what takes so much time.

You know, it's really funny, Chef, when you think about, oh, I have to make the pies, and then when— I mean, this took less than 10 minutes.

Now granted, you know, you have to get all the ingredients out, and that really is taking your prep time. It's just getting everything out. But yeah, and there were more ingredients in this than a lot of things just because of the type of base it was. So that was, that was my pecan pie. And you know, there's a ton of recipes out there. There's different ways to do it. Some don't use as many eggs, some use more corn syrup. So it's just a matter of, you know, what you're using and what you like. All right, so that's that. Now we're going to make a pumpkin pie. And the pumpkin pie recipe I use is actually off the Libby's can, and I have found that to have been the best pie I have made in terms of pumpkin. So I'm going to whip these eggs up, and let me— I have to do them really fast, so I'm going to turn the mic off and you can keep everybody entertained while I do that.

I sure will, go right ahead. You know, when I look at the KitchenAid mixer, it reminds me, or at least it looks like a KitchenAid mixer, it reminds me of where to put the mixer in the kitchen. A mixer like this can be very, very heavy. And the thing is, if you're going to store it a place other than the countertop, to take it from, say, a pantry onto the countertop, you know, you kind of sometimes then you don't, it's not worth the bother and you don't want to, you know, oh, I have to get the mixer out. I kind of think a KitchenAid mixer or certain mixers are— they're lovely to look at. They're sculptural and they deserve a place on the counter. And if you put things— also, same can be said for the Cuisinart or other prep machines. Keep them on the counter. You don't have to, you know, put them away and then drag them out. I will say sometimes what I've done is I've created almost armoire pieces, freestanding furniture pieces, and when the two doors open, there's a bottom that also comes forward that's actually— it's deep, it's 2 feet deep, and on that surface, that's sort of a home for small appliances in the kitchen. So, when the doors are closed, it's a beautiful furniture piece, and when the doors are open, that's where all the small appliances are. You can take them directly from the shelf and put it on the surface, and that work surface, the armoire, could be 3 feet wide or longer. So, it's actually a good way to, you know, to store appliances so that they have a home.

And that's excellent advice, because if it's not where you can get to it and use it, more than likely you're not gonna.

Yeah.

Normally I keep mine right on the counter behind me, so it's easy to get to, it's easy to use. You can just pull it out. I generally put it over on the island, but if I'm in a hurry, I can just leave it where it is, right back in the corner, actually, where the paper towels are, and just pull it out when I need it. Okay, so the Libby's pumpkin pie is really a very easy— and this is an old recipe, it's something they've had around for years. And the one thing you want to remember when you're making that is to get pumpkin puree and not pumpkin pie mix, because we want to use the puree and we want to make it, make it a little bit tastier. So I whipped up the eggs and they are a little stiffer than the last ones. They're not quite as just foamy. They have a little bit more volume to it. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to put in some sugar, and then I have some pumpkin pie spice here, which is basically— and you can use just plain cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and any combination that you like. Some years I would just put cinnamon in it, but this year I actually got some pumpkin pie spice, and that has a little What do you think of—

I also like cardamom, I like allspice.

Yep, yep. This one has a little allspice in it.

Any combination. I just have to interject and tell you one thing. One year I made pumpkin pie from the pumpkin.

Oh yeah.

From the actual pumpkin. It wasn't worth it.

No.

It wasn't worth the effort.

You would think it would be though, wouldn't you?

Yep.

So then we're going to put the pumpkin in. The only thing after you do the eggs, the only thing you reserve is the, the evaporated milk. Everything else goes. So it's not like it's a big deal. And, you know, and when you're measuring these things out, like, I have little separate containers. You can just put the sugar, the spices, anything else in one bowl and just keep your wet ingredients separate. You don't have to get that crazy. And these are not going to mix too, too much. I just want I just want to get it mixed together. Then I'm going to take a rubber spatula in here and just finish getting it around because I've inflated those eggs a little bit, so I'm trying not to deflate them totally. Not that it's going to— I don't think it's going to make a whole lot of difference, but I am. So then we're going to pour in— I'm going to turn this down on low, and I'm going to start to put in the evaporated milk. And I have a little shot of vanilla in the evaporated milk. Now I usually find that what they tell you to put in is just a little bit more evaporated milk than you need, so I usually leave just a little bit out. It's a shame, I don't always have something else to do with it.

Now, Chef.

Yes.

Evaporated milk, I mean, I've always put it in my recipes, whatever it tells me to put in. I mean, you know, dumb question, what is evaporated milk?

Well, from what I can gather, it's just milk that's kind of been reduced a little bit.

That's what I thought.

Yeah, it's condensed milk is the proper name, the other name for it. So it's just been— it's a little thicker. You can get sweetened evaporated milk too, they have that. So, and that's made for, you know, you get that for making some other items, dulce de leche.

So it's rich, it gives you that rich sort of quality.

All right, so this I actually have a regular pie shell for because I don't— pumpkin is probably my least favorite and it's Lisa's favorite, so I didn't want to take a chance on it being not real good because of the gluten. Okay, see, and leaving out just a little bit, it would have been full to the top, but this kind of makes it That all the liquid, I think, makes it a little bit denser too.

Yeah, no, it looks, it looks great to me. And like you say, you can't go wrong with a, with a premade crust. I went to, I think this weekend, it was my daughter's birthday and she wanted pies from this special place. We bought 2 pies, they had, you know, the pie crust over. The crust was so tough. I mean, don't make a pie if you're going to have a tough crust. It was so tough. It was, you know, so you can't go wrong with the premade.

No, you know, I just, I would probably not look at the ingredients list because I'm sure it's got quite a few things that you really would not put in.

Oh yeah.

But you know, again, it's Thanksgiving. It's not like you're going to eat this pie every day. Of the year. It's gonna be a one-time thing. People are gonna eat it, and it's gonna save you a little time. You saw how fast that was to make. Really takes no time. Make your pies the night before too. Don't kill yourself.

I was going to ask you, can you even do them 2 days before?

Sure. How long do you think they sit in restaurants when you order?

That's exactly what I was thinking.

Or in the store, God forbid. Yeah. Okay, so this is the next step. And then, all right, the last pie we have is an apple cranberry pie. So what I have here is I have 6 large apples cut up, and this is probably way too much, but I'll make some little ones too. And then I have a cup of sugar, I have some cinnamon and some salt, and then I'm just going to mix this together. Try and coat. And I should have a bigger bowl to make it easier.

So, I mean, sometimes I see recipes with cream, a little lemon juice, whatever you like.

I mean, this is just a really basic apple pie.

Yeah, that's, uh, that's the pure apple pie.

Okay, and then I've got that cranberry sauce that I made 2 weeks ago that I've still been eating. I've been having it on my chicken sandwiches. It's been great.

Oh, I bet.

Oh yeah, it came to me. I wasn't remembering, and then I said, I got cranberry sauce in there. Then I'm just going to mix this together.

Yeah, see, this is where your hands were made to mix.

Yeah, and I do have some rubber gloves in the drawer if people were over so I don't freak them out. But they don't trust the chef, don't eat with the chef. Alright, so here, that's it.

Oh, I love the colors.

One thing about apple is you want to mound it because it's going to cook down. And I did cut these, you can see they're kind of— what I did was I cut thick slices and then I cut them in half. So I'm going to work this in.

Yeah, I do like chunkier. I absolutely like chunkier apples.

Well, I think you can get more of them in too. Went into the space because I like a really nice dense pie.

Yeah, I do too. I do too.

So you could make another pie crust, or if you bought a pie crust, just take it from— like usually they come 2 in a package. We'll take the second one, turn it over. Do yourself a favor though, keep it frozen to get it out of the the tin, or if you want to put these in your own pie shells, pie pans, so it does look like you even made it, because honestly no one's really going to know you didn't. Take it out frozen though, because it's going to be a lot easier to move, it's going to be a lot easier to deal with if it's frozen.

Good idea.

So here, this is done. I don't always like the second crust pies because they crack, they can get ugly. What I do love is a nice streusel topping.

I do too.

And this is basically what I make is flour, sugar, and oatmeal with butter, and that's pretty much all it is. So this way I can put it in and I can get in all the little nooks and crannies here.

That looks so good. That looks so wonderful. Wow.

Bake, and what you want to do as it starts to cook is probably just cut a little, little small steam hole in it somewhere so it will fall a little bit with the pie. Otherwise, it's liable to stay up and not go down with it. So it's great to have a few holes.

How long will that— that looks like some pies, I know I've had recipes where they say An hour and a half?

You know, they do, but I won't give it that long. Usually a rule of thumb for me in pies is about 55 minutes.

Like 350?

55 minutes to an hour, you know, in that range, 350 degrees. And you can see I just poked a couple little holes in here, just so hopefully some steam will come out, and then this will fall as— it'll sink down with the pot it goes.

And what about a convection, convection heat, a convection oven? Would you, would you put that on?

Well, if I have convection, sure. What I did find as I was baking, while I enjoyed convection to cut down times on a lot of dishes, I stopped using it for baking. And I stopped using it for baking because sometimes I felt like it browned the product too much in a short period of time, and if it needed more cooking, it was almost like rushing it too much. The ones at work worked really well, and I always use convection, but my home convection— now granted, it's probably nowhere near as powerful— it just didn't seem to do me that much of a favor. And generally, I'm not in that much of a rush with a baked good, especially if you're doing a cookie that's gonna take 7 to 10 minutes. You know, you're— I think you're just playing with fire using convection then unless you really have it down pat. But I stopped using— like, I'd make banana breads, especially when it's something really dense. I stopped using the convection because it seemed like the center— I wasn't— it was starting to get dark and pull away and the center still wasn't done.

Yeah, I think, I think it depends on what you're making. I made a turkey breast the other day in the new house which has a convection oven. It's a professional range, yay! And it's a convection oven and it was— the skin's crisp and the inside was moist and it really was.

Yep, meats and casseroles, perfect. Love it for that. And it does cut down— it was just the baked goods. I mean, you know, and again, I'm not an accomplished baker, so I may not know the tricks involved in bringing it— and really using it properly. I stopped because I had one at home. It wasn't a professional one, but I had a convection. I just seemed not— I wasn't as happy with the baking results. I don't have one here, so it's just as well. I'll bake all 3 of these pies, and we'll have this one for dinner tonight.

What are you going to do with all these pies?

2 of them will go to school. We may cut out a little wedge of pumpkin after, at least I don't want to OD her on it because Thanksgiving is coming.

Yeah.

This was good practice for me because I have guests coming over for Thanksgiving, so I can practice my pies first. I wanted to see how these gluten-free shells were, so I'll get to taste it on this and see if it's something that I need to make by hand because it is kind of strange. Now, I did— this thing is gluten-free too.

Oh, it is?

Yeah.

Okay.

They have so many cup-for-cup flour mixes. Mine was a cup-for-cup flour, or may call an equivalent that you don't have to screw with, and you can just use it in lieu. If it says regular flour, just use one of these flour mixes because it's all— it's been scientifically— the proportions have been done for you. A lot of real true, you know, diehard gluten-free people have their own recipes that that they have worked on over— before there were all these really easy mixes to use. They don't switch. They'll know which flour— sorghum, white rice flour, brown rice flour— what starches they have to use.

I have a feeling I'm going to get an education after the holidays when we really plunge into this. There's a few comments. Coach G. Moore says— there's a few comments about substitutes for the corn syrup? Mm-hmm. Coach G. Moore's asking about honey, if that's possible.

Is it too sweet? It may be too sweet because the carob, if you remember, if you've ever used it— I know in the old days, if you didn't have maple syrup, that was a substitute for maple syrup for waffles or pancakes. It's not quite as sweet, so I would be afraid that the honey would be overly sweet. You could probably use some honey, but then you would have to cut back your sugars. What you need is you need one of these, unfortunately, that type of refined syrup, I think, to give it the sustenance in the body and to create that kind of texture that we've come to know with pecan pies. And honestly, that's the only thing I ever keep it in the house for. I think I had a cup of— a bottle of Karo in the house for ages. I just never needed it for anything else.

Interesting. Deborah Rock is asking about— I don't know how you say it— agave syrup.

Agave is great for sweetening. I think agave is fairly thin, though. I don't know. Like I said, I know some of my healthier eaters since I'm really— this is new to me, would have some better ways to do these. I would.

So, well, so we're experimenting together, we're learning together.

And I did finish decorating this pie a little bit too.

Very nice. Nice. I can see you're, you're a control freak. Look at those pecans, or should I say pecans?

Pecans. One thing about pecans or pecans, too, is that Texas pecans are reputed to be less bitter than Georgia pecans.

I think you'd be having a big fight about that between Georgians and Texans.

Absolutely. Pecans have that little bit of bitterness to them sometimes, and the Texas pecans Pecans have been said to be not quite as bitter. I remember growing up, we had a pecan tree in the front yard. My grandmother had a pecan tree. They were everywhere.

Wow, wow. Okay, so then we have the pecans, we have the apple, and where's our pumpkin?

Pumpkin is in the back, and it's kind of loose, so I don't want to move it too much.

Okay.

Spilling, but it is back there. You saw I made 3 pies, and granted, it took me It took me an hour to set up for, and the biggest thing was just taking things out and measuring them. Peeling the apples took a little while, then chopping the apples. That I left for last because I knew it was going to— that would be— once it was done, that was the worst part of it to me, was peeling apples.

Yes, you're right about that. In recent years, I have been putting all of my efforts into the main meal, and I've delegated desserts to other people. I think I need to you know, get back into desserts this year. I— because it's— it's— I love the rustic nature of it when you, you know, like the apple, especially the crumble. I love a crumble type of topping, you know.

If you don't want to do a pie, like if you didn't want to do this apple in a pie, you could put it in a baking dish and just cover with a crumble and make a crisp. You know, that's wonderful. You can't cut it, but you can scoop it, and you can serve it with a little ice cream if you want to, or make some fresh whipped cream because you want that with the pumpkin pie, too.

That's right. And then you know what we do? We keep the platter out on the countertop for the next few days, and everyone takes a spoon and takes a little bit of it as they're walking through the kitchen. Grab a spoon, you know, so that's half the fun. Beautiful dishes, Chef.

Well, thank you, and I hope you saw how easy it was to make pies. And again, this is not something I do every day, so it's not like I'm practiced at making pies. I have not made pies in well over a year. I haven't been working as a chef in well over a year.

They look good to me. I think they look good to everyone.

I'm just saying that's how fast they are. You know, if you can do it quick, it's really simple. And cranberry sauce, if you don't want to put it in there, don't. The original recipe for this pie had walnuts in it too, but I've never been a fan of getting something crunchy in my apple pie.

Yeah, yeah, no, I'm with you on that too.

Pears would work great if you want to make a pear pie or an apple pear pie. You know, it's always nice to mix it up. Throw some raisins in there if you like, or currants or anything. Like that.

Even pieces of dried apricots too.

Absolutely. I just bought some dried apricots. I was thinking about them.

Yeah, yeah, no, that's good. Beautiful, beautiful pies. Easy.

Another easiest pie.

Easy as pie. There we go.

All right, well, thank you all for stopping by Around the Kitchen Table. Susan, I love your new office. I can't wait to see your fireplace lit and you can show us around after you get set up a little bit.

When the kitchen is clean, maybe next week we'll go through the kitchen.

Sounds good. Next week we will do some gravies, and I'll come up with a little bit more. I'm not going to cook a turkey. I would like to show you how to do it. I might get a breast, though, and cook that down. We'll come up with some other ideas for you. If you have any questions or things you might like to see next week's show before Thanksgiving, let us know.

Good idea.

We'll see you around the kitchen table.

Have a good one.

Bye-bye.