Before I get to the results of my Real Pumpkin Pumpkin Pie versus Canned Pumpkin Pumpkin pie taste test, I’d like to fill you in on a couple of the highlights from the Thanksgiving dinner I hosted for my family this weekend.
It started out wonderfully. The table was set beautifully, all rustic and Thanksgivingly. Thanksgivingish. Thanksgivingishly. It looked like it was going to be another warm and loving family dinner.
The Noteworthy Events
2:00 p.m. My sister’s friend Marilyn and her sister Maggie arrive out of the blue with a Thanksgiving gift basket filled with organic maple syrup, a candy apple, Hershey kisses, and homemade CRANBERRY SAUCE! And just like that, I knew this was going to be the most perfect, magical, soap opera-like Thanksgiving EVER.
3:45 p.m. My first guest (my 15 year old niece) arrives on time for the appointed dinner service of 5:00 p.m.
5:00 p.m. The rest of the guests start to trickle in. For my dinner that was scheduled to begin at 5:00.
5:05 p.m. General mayhem as the house fills up with parents, kids, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, and a couple of grandmothers.
5:10 p.m. My other niece shows up with an armful of ingredients asking if she can cook something. In my oven. Which is full of the food everyone else brought. All she needs is a pan, some butter, full access to the stove and oven and about half an hour in the kitchen. For my dinner that begins at 5:00. Um. (we compromised, she sauteed the escargot in garlic butter, but didn’t stuff them in the mushroom caps and put them in the already very pregnant oven. The escargot were good all on their own anyway)
5:15 – 7:00 p.m. Unbeknownst to me, my boyfriend has paid my 15 year old niece $2 to stand in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room making it almost impossible for me to get in and out of the two. She is spewing random facts she finds on the Internet the whole time. Um, no. I didn’t know that about Justin Bieber. This was a plotted plan concocted for the sole purpose of annoying me. Both my niece and my boyfriend think this is hilarious. One of them is 15 years old. The other only thinks he is.
7:00 p.m. We sit down to my 5:00 p.m. Thanksgiving dinner.
7:02 p.m. I look over and notice one of my sisters is eating her dinner with a grapefruit knife.
7:05 p.m. Dinner is done. And it only took 15 hours to prepare for.
7:07 p.m. All families have a Thanksgiving tradition that is passed down from generation to generation. Many begin their meals with a prayer, or just declaring what they’re thankful for in their lives. My family is too busy fist fighting over who gets the most stuffing for these distractions, so we like to END our meal with a tradition. The Gobble Off. It goes something like this.
Congratulations Barry! You get to take home the bedazzled pumpkins on the dining room table your wife told me she hated.
7:25 p.m. Everyone is milling about, mostly hanging out in the dining room waiting for coffee and dessert … the aforementioned Pumpkin Pie! I enter the dining room to clear the table and this is what I find:
Inside one of those crackers you see in the first shot of my dining room table, was a measuring tape. And so my family, is measuring each other’s heads. As I’m sure most families across Canada were doing on this fine Thanksgiving Day.
And that pretty much sums up the entire evening. NOTHING went according to plan.
And that’s your little take-away from this post. Remember it the next time you host a dinner party.
It will NOT go as you planned. Things will not be perfect, and it will not resemble something you see on a soap opera. At least one food item will be served cold, children may end up climbing into the house through an open window and your sister may end up eating with a grapefruit knife.
Roll with it. Honestly, for your own mental health. It’s a lot better to have your head measured than have it explode.
As it turns out I’ve lied to you. I don’t have time for the pumpkin pie results today.
I’ve been too busy recalling this Thanksgiving dinner which, quite frankly was no different than any other family dinner we’ve had. Except the one time we set the dining room table on fire a few Christmases ago. My sister’s gel nail caught on fire that year too. That dinner stands out a bit from the rest.
Check back tomorrow to see which pie won the Pumpkin Pie taste test!
21.5 ” by the way.
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