The new "best pie in the world" !!!

Happy belated Thanksgiving! I hope everyone had a wonderful day of feasting! We did. Oh boy, did we. Jim and I generally cook Thanksgiving dinner at our house -- my parents live in town, but since my mom is the Christmas guru, she doesn't mind letting us handle Thanksgiving. She basically can't wait for it to be over so she can put up Christmas decorations! I know the feeling -- Jim actually wants to go get a Christmas tree today but I don't think it will be today. Maybe Sunday. Here we are, in the kitchen:

Anyway, there was a time when cooking Thanksgiving freaked me out, but we've gotten really good at it! Everything came out amazing, from the perfect turkey to the best pie in the world. And of course, half the fun is decorating and setting the table, and this year we put our Chiapas textiles to good use! Above you can see the embroidered table runner (love it!) and here is a wall hanging, above some appetizers.
When we were in Mexico loading up on these weavings, an Israeli tourist we met asked us doubtfully, "But will you really use them? Will you really put them in your house?" Well, I guess so! I could picture her house, though, from the question. It must be a little less colorful than ours! Since we live in a wee cottage, we don't have a formal dining room and when we break out the "big table" we have to put it in the living room, like this:
It's cozy. We didn't have any other family come to town this year, so it was just Jim and me and my parents. This is my mom:
Well, of course, Leroy was there too. This is one of his favorite days of the year (and used to be Shiloh's too. We always miss her bossy expectant face in the doorway when there's a turkey in the oven.) Look at Leroy about to catch a bite of turkey in mid-air:
He's a very skilled turkey catcher!

My mom did, of course, help furnish the foodstuffs, including this spinach, persimmon, and candied pecan salad. YUM. And behind it is a raspberry and pomegranate gelatin made with prosecco instead of water, so it's frizzante like champagne. SO good.
And finally, it was time to eat!
You know how you cook all night and all day, and in about fifteen minutes your are FULL? Still, it's totally worth it. Oh yeah, and then hours later, as soon as you can move again, there's pie.
The one I'm holding is the Best Pie in the World. It's coconut cream, and the recipe comes from the Blue Bonnet Cafe in Marble Falls, Texas, though Jim used his own pastry crust recipe. He's the piemaker in the family. I have no patience for pastry crust! Coconut cream was my choice, though. I love coconut, and while I love the idea of coconut cream pie, I couldn't remember when or even IF I'd ever actually had it. Hm. Perhaps it would have been best to leave it at that, because this pie was so awesomely good that I want to have it for every meal! And I think Jim may even be swayed temporarily from his defense of fruit pies as the Best Pies, to join the cult of cream pies.
He might even make another one next week, because he has a disc of pastry dough in the fridge ready to go, and because there is only a little bit left over (we didn't eat it all between the four of us! Dear friends came by for dessert).

Though this hasn't been the greatest year in a lot of ways, for my family, there is still much to be thankful for, and I am very, very thankful -- for health and love and for having enough. Not a ton, not a fortune, but enough for food and health insurance and a house, with a little left over to save and a little to contribute to people at home and abroad who have so much less to be grateful for. Happy holidays to everyone, and remember the food banks and homeless shelters this season. They are having a very hard time meeting needs. Hugs!