Blessed Beyond Measure: Thanksgiving Pie Practice

I'm no Suzie Homemaker, but sometimes I try to be. I often fail, but sometimes I succeed. Sometimes I swing and miss, but sometimes, oh sometimes, I hit it out of the park.

I've gotta be honest and say I had some coaching from someone fabulous. She's fantastic and I don't think I'll ever have as much skill as she does, but she's happy to share, so her kindness is my gain.

Thanksgiving was never one of my favorite holidays growing up, but ever since Ben and I started doing them ourselves, it's now one of my favorite days of the year (second only to Christmas, which I've always loved best).

We've hosted the last three years but this year we're going to be celebrating at our friend's hose instead. I't's bittersweet because I've loved hosting the last three years, but our friends home is much more appropriate for a big group for dinner, and our oven is broke and a turkey won't fit in our toaster oven!

Anyway, this year Ben is making his famous stuffing (of course), and I wanted to make a spectacular dessert. I have a small arsenal of options I know are good, but this year I wanted to go big. I wanted to challenge myself and got for the big guns. I wanted to make a pie. From scratch.

I had no idea how to make a pie, but I had heard they were tricky. Lucky for me, my BFF Ree was there to help a girl out. I can pretty much trust that anything she says is good is in fact, good, but with an event as big as Thanksgiving, a trial run was a must. So, yesterday, I made my first pie.

The first step to any pie is the crust. Oh man, the crust is important. It seems much more difficult to screw up a sweet filling, but the crust has little wiggle room. I referenced this recipe for directions but adapted it with some organic, whole wheat flour courtesy of Bob's Red Mill instead of regular flour and butter instead of vegetable shortening (I don't know what is better to use, but I'm trying to use as little processed/fake junk as possible).

I mixed all the ingredients and wrapped by two disks of dough in wax paper and thought to myself, "Gee, this is easy, I don't know what the big deal is." Then, I had to roll the dough out. I quickly understood. Ha! Two attempts, a few patches and a desperate phone call to my mama later, I had a somewhat round piece of dough and I carefully placed it in my pan.

I moved onto the filling, giving myself carpel tunnel while peeling my apples. This pie is called Scrumptious Apple Pie and it definitely lives up to it's name! I omitted the caramel and walnuts for my trial run because I forgot to buy them at the store, but I don't really think they are needed.

This pie is amazing. Let me show you...