Easy As Pie!

Fresh Pumpkin Pie

And when I say “Fresh”, I don’t mean from the oven. I mean, from the goddamn gourd. It is hard to say what possessed me, but I took on the challenge of creating a scratch-masterpiece of pumpkin pastry for Gabriel.

On Saturday, we made our way through the hot, dusty, remote, landscape of the Pinery Pumpkin Patch to find the perfect specimen of a jack-o-lantern in the rough. We stalked them in their natural environment.

Gabriel took to kicking the poor, steamy squash in frustration, when he couldn’t successfully wrap his scrawny arms around them to carry them home. We tried to protect them, but what you may not know about pumpkins on a sunny hillside is that those suckers can roll! They roll quickly, and not in a straight and sensible line. No way—they bob and weave making it nearly impossible to predict their path. Every time his Stride Rite even grazed one of those orbs, it made a mad dash for the border. And Dave and I stumbled pathetically though the dry vines and rocky soil to rescue it before a premature death by smashing.

Turns out, there is a very good reason pumpkins are attached to vines.

After a tractor ride across the parched terrain, my suspicions were confirmed that farms are truly the ideal setting for horror films. Then we winded our way through the corn maze. At the half-way point, Gabriel wanted to leave which posed a small problem for the two parents paying no attention to the path. We were frantically snapping as many pictures as possible before the battery in our camera went dead.

Personally, I am not a fan of corn mazes. I don’t mind telling you, they freak me out. Think…Children of the Corn. That movie and my general anxiety disorder suck the fun out of vertical vegetation labyrinths, but thankfully this one wasn’t terribly tall, so I could see basic landmarks to get us out—dirt, hill, dust, tree, tractor.

Head for the tractor, kids!

We loaded up our wheelbarrow with pumpkins and squash and Indian corn, and headed for the minivan. As we filled the truck with the orange roly-polys, Gabriel asked, “Are we going to make pumpkin pie?” I said, “Well, we are going to make Jack-o-lanterns.” “Can we make pumpkin pie?” “Well, I guess we could make pumpkin pie.”

In the car, I thought of what a total idiot I was to agree to make pumpkin pie. I don’t particularly like pumpkin pie and the thought of making it from scratch seemed a bit like a vegan raising chickens for their eggs—a lot of effort and time for a food product that you won’t even eat.

But as we got closer to civilization, I romanticized about the endeavor. I reconsidered and began to embrace the challenge. Maybe I didn’t really like pumpkin pie because I had never had “fresh” pumpkin pie. Sure, it was all about the quality of the orange mush, which made a squash-custard dessert unappealing to me.

Yes, I would make one from scratch! I could do it. How hard could it be?

This morning we sawed open the pumpkin, I knew we would need all day to accomplish this dish. We had to start early if we were going to be eating pie after dinner. We opened the pumpkin’s belly and scraped out it’s guts. Gabriel looked at the bowl of innards and asked, “Is that pumpkin pie?” No, we have to cook it.

And then, I baked the enormous chunks of pumpkin flesh for an hour. When it came out of the oven, Gabriel looked at the hot, wilted wedges and asked, “Is that the pumpkin pie?” No, we have to puree the pumpkin and mix the pie filling.

After the pumpkin flesh cooled, I scraped it out again and put it the flesh in the food processor. I made the pumpkin puree, Gabriel looked at the goop and asked…well you know what he asked. No, it is just the pumpkin puree, I have to add spices to make the filling.

“Oh, spices. I only like Basil.” Well, sweetheart, there is no basil in pumpkin pie.

So, as I waited for the piecrust to thaw (no, I was not going to make that from scratch too—I do have a life), we carved pumpkins. Gabriel was thrilled to pull the gooey guts out of another ripe gourd. He drew a silly face on it with markers and I carved the thing for him. When I presented him with his custom Jack-o-lantern, he said, “Is that the pumpkin pie?” I kid you not! Dave and I were doubled over laughing.

“No, that is a Jack-o-lantern.”

I must admit, that was the final straw for me. The pursuit of the perfect fresh pumpkin pie was suddenly deserted (Please tell me you enjoyed that one as much as I did.). Mercilessly sent down the mountainside, along with its renegade brothers and sisters. This kid didn’t have a clue what he was asking me for. I could have handed him a mango, called it a pumpkin pie, and taken a nap.

They say you should always respect your children’s intelligence and realize that they are smarter than you think. You should never talk down to them or ridicule them for their innocence or perspectives. You should engage them, and discover with them, and share in their interests.

Perhaps, I have taken it too far. Perhaps, there is a distinct limit to the amount of authority on any subject, which a preschooler should be afforded. Perhaps, I need to ask more questions, before I scour the web and the Amish-community for the best fresh pumpkin pie recipe and spend the better half of my day trying to replicate it. Perhaps, the boy just wanted to know what a pumpkin pie actually was—in light of experiencing all of these big, bulbous squash, which suspiciously share the same name. Evidently, I mistook curiosity for knowledge and interest for passion.

The good news: The fresh pumpkin muffins are delicious. Gabriel loves them.