The Great Pie Experiment

This Thanksgiving I have decided to attempt something I have never made before as my contribution to the family food table. I have been camping on a pecan pie recipe for months now, secretly holding it away for the Thanksgiving feast. I figured that if there was ever an opportunity to test your dessert on unknowing subjects, it would be Thanksgiving dinner.

Here's the rundown. This recipe is for a 9.5 inch pie.

CRUST!
1 cup flour
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 stick (1/4 cup) cold butter
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1 large egg

Now, you will probably notice the complete absence of any water in this crust recipe. After making this, I'm convinced this is a typo as one egg simply doesn't provide enough moisture to make a respectable dough of any kind.

Mix the flour, sugar, powder, and butter together until it forms loose clumps. Then add your pecans and egg. Keep turning the dough until smooth. Make it into a ball, wrap it in plastic wrap, throw it in the fridge for one hour, then pull it out and make your crust. I added water to the dough as needed to allow me to form the crust properly.


FILLING!
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup dark corn syrup
1/2 cup heavy cream
3 tbsp butter
3 large eggs
2 cups pecans

First, put your sugar, corn syrup, cream, and butter into a medium saucepan and cook on medium heat. You'll need to get this mixture just up to a constant boil so keep an eye on it. Be sure to stir frequently as, since its mostly sugar, you don't want it to completely carmelize. While this is heating up, take your eggs (in a separate container) and beat them until all the yolky lumps are out of it.

At this point, start heating your oven to 350.

Once your sugar mixture has hit the boiling point, pour it into a separate bowl and allow it to cool. After it cools down, pour in your eggs, and give it a good mix. Once you got it all mixed together, pour it into your crust and then top it off with your 2 cups of pecans.

Stick that bad boy in the oven for 45 minutes. I'd advise covering the crust with aluminum foil at the 35 minute mark to avoid burning.

The final result should look something like this.


My family all thought the pie was great, although I will say unless you absolutely love pecans with a passion I would cut the toppings down to about 1.5 cups or even 1 cup of pecans. Overall I was pleased with the pie, but I will likely lower the nut quotient next time I make this.

Victory!

Firstly, my apologies for falling off the wagon with the blog. I tend to go through periods where so much happens that I really don't have time to make it to the ol' blog to post something.

This last weekend I made a wager as to the outcome of the annual BYU vs Utah football game. Thanks largely to Max "Turnover Machine" Hall, Utah emerged triumphant by a margin of 48-24. This was excellent news for me, as my wager with Mike was that whoever won, we'd wear those shirts on Monday.


Excellent news for me. For Mike, not so much. Go Utes!

Insanity... (Updated)

Well, as many have probably noticed by now, the video of the children praising the Messiah has been removed from YouTube.

I'm actually quite curious as to what has precipitated this move, but if I had to guess I'd put my money on the rather large number of comments claiming the children were being exploited without any real knowledge of what they were singing about - not that having no idea what you're talking about has ever stopped anyone from engaging in politics.

In somewhat unrelated news, I am shocked and amazed -insert sarcasm here- that our $850 billion Bailout package ($700 billion plus $150 in pork) plus a coordinated rate cut by every civilized nation has failed to stem the destruction of our economy. You'd think with as much as Ben Bernanke claims to have studied the Great Depression, he'd know more than anyone that GOVERNMENT CANNOT FIX THIS PROBLEM, they will only make it worse. The artificially inflated markets need to be punctured. The businesses that took excessive risks need to fail.

I realize that there will be huge, HUGE economic hardship when (not if) this happens. We need to just let it happen... not completely debase our currency or needlessly throw away almost a trillion dollars in a futile attempt to stop it.

Insanity...

I found this video on YouTube today and I'd like to share it with you all. If this is not the most freakish, disturbing display of.... good grief I don't even know what of but it really disturbed me.


Part of me wonders if these children even know what the hell they are even singing about. I was even more disturbed at the lyrics after the initial shock wore off...

We're gonna spread happiness
We're gonna spread freedom
Obama's gonna change it
Obama's gonna lead 'em

We're gonna change it
And rearrange it
We're gonna change the world.

Now's the moment, lift each voice to sing
Sing with all your heart!
For our children, for our families,
Nations all joined as one.
Sing for joy and sing abundant peace,
Courage, justice, hope!
Sing together, hold each precious hand,
Lifting each other up;
Sing for vision, sing for unity,
Lifting our hearts to Sing!

YES WE CAN (insert puking sound here)

So... let me get this straight. Change the world... Rearrange the world... Nations joined as one. This would be an awesome concept... in Soviet Russia. This is what I don't understand about these nutjob liberals/socialists. Socialism has failed, over and over and over again in all other parts of the world. What could possess anyone to believe that it will work here in America?

Often times I feel like I'm starting to become one of the few people in this country that enjoys my individuality, that enjoys the government not being in every single facet of my life. I don't want to have the same life as my neighbor. I don't want massive government sponsored initiatives that force us to live in perfect government mandated peace and harmony. I don't want people to be punished for being successful so that their money can go to fund the lazy and uneducated. I don't want "running to Uncle Sam" to be people's first option when it should be the complete and total last resort.

But like I said, sometimes I think I'm the only person who feels this way anymore.

Fantasy Football Goodness

So its been a little while since I've posted anything in the good ol' blogger blog, so I thought I'd get started with an intro to Fantasy Football 101. Rule #1: Its a bad idea to invite your wife to your fantasy football league, and an even worse idea to play her early on in the season.

This is especially true when your wife has exceptionally good luck, as mine does. This week I learned a true lesson in humiliation as my Hatemonger University was completely demolished by the Bookworm Tarus - 112 to 57. Yes, she about doubled my score... awesome! With this public spanking I fall to 2-1-1 which puts me one game out of the division lead and half a game back for the lone Wild Card spot. Suffice to say I'm not in a great spot however there is 10 weeks left in the season, so there is still hope.