Fakes-giving

My absolute favorite part of Thanksgiving is cooking and baking with my daughters...I think they both feel the same. Since Cass will be celebrating the holiday with hubby's family this year, I thought it would be fun if we had our own early "Fakes-giving!"


Discussing pie recipes, Dean jumped into the planning details and suggested we make a pumpkin pie completely from scratch. He's always FULL of good ideas and so helpful when it comes to pie!

Surprisingly...though I am known as the pie queen, I have never made my own pumpkin pie puree. Cass and I did some googling where The Pioneer Woman assured us it was super easy and totally worth the effort!

Ugh...I always inadvertently leave my cabinet doors open when I cook.

Grown specifically for baking, we carefully cut the perfect pumpkins into halves...

maybe enjoying the cutting part a little too much!

Convincing Dean that this is the part he's always good at, he helped us scrape out the pumpkin guts.

This was probably our least favorite part. I use the word "our" loosely since clearly I am behind the camera and not elbow deep in pumpkin guts!

Ready for roasting!

After roasting the chunks for twice as long as The Pioneer Woman instructed...the pumpkin was finally fork tender and ready to puree.

Puree...and puree...and puree some more!

We were so proud...practically Pioneer Women ourselves!

As for the results...yes! One Hundred and Ten Percent yes! The flavor, the texture, the pie! Absolutely worth the effort and I would do it again!

Thanks a bunch Dean...that just made Pie Night more intense and complicated!