Putting a modern twist on traditional Thanksgiving pie recipes

by Susan Hamilton


The fun begins at the food sorting process. You walk in with still warm dishes in hand, and you are told instantly the location in which your food will reside for the remainder of the day, like Thanksgiving neighborhoods. There is the main dish drive, the side dish street and canned congealed cranberry circle. However, your mind is already racing down the dessert highway.

You glance over the familiar offerings of pumpkin pie, pecan pie and something with meringue on top. Typically, I am a traditionalist and park myself near the pecan pie. A pecan pie that I will eat on all day, in varying slice sizes, depending on how full the tank is.

However, last year, my world was rocked by an unfamiliar addition to the usual suspects, a chocolate pecan pie. What? I resisted this mutant pie for most of the day, snubbing this anomaly for my traditional favorites. Until, with wide eyes, my grandmother asked if I had tried her chocolate pecan pie. An internal struggle brewed. I would never deny my lovely grandmother the yearly satisfaction of watching her grandchild enjoy her homemade pie, however this was new, different and in fact more fright than I had anticipated on the lazy November day of eating.

With her help, we cut a over sized slice of the darkly colored pie and with fork trembling, I gave it a taste.

It. Was. Delicious! The combination of chocolate and oven topped pecans was a scrumptious surprise. I ate the entire slice, and the drive home was a fidgeting, button endurance challenge.

So, now I am in the process of evaluating delicious alternatives to our tried and true Thanksgiving pies.

I have found quite a few recipes and am torn on which to try. There is an Apple-Pumpkin Pie, a Caramel Pumpkin Pie and a Bourbon Pecan Pie. I think I will go with the Bourbon Pecan Pie this year!