Pearberry Pie

We had one of the most wonderful of all Thanksgivings here in Iowa this year. My parents and my sister and her husband came to visit, and boy did we have a good time. We ate a lot and shopped a lot! And, that is what Thanksgiving is for, right?

For our fanciful feast we were in charge of bringing the sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce and pie to my mother-in-law's place. I had a great time planning the menu! Here's what we brought:

Sweet potatoes - a wonderful recipe from Em. She used the recipe last year and raved about it, so I had to try it this year! Who knew that sweet potatoes could be even better with chopped pecans rather than marshmallows? It was awesome!

Mashed potatoes - an easy peasy recipe that I threw together. Kinda the basic sour-cream-mashed-potato combo that most people do.

Stuffing - an interesting recipe from Oprah. Kind of a random place to get a recipe, I know, but it's Oprah's favorite! Anyway, the orange juice in it gives it an interesting kick. The girls seemed to like it and the boys thought it was a little weird. Isn't it kinda true that men don't like citrus-y things?

Cranberry Chutney - another one of Em's winners. This sauce has pears, golden raisins and cranberries. Seriously, it's better than any cranberry sauce I've ever seen or tasted.

Pearberry Pie - this was the big risk of the evening, but it turned out to be a hit! I needed to try something that was a little "out there". Cause I'm like that . . . and . . . my mother-in-law was providing wonderful standbys like apple crisp and pumpkin pie, so I knew that if mine failed we would still be eating well. Turns out the pear and cranberry mixture is the perfect combination of "sweet" and "tart" in a pie. Did you see the crust in the picture, too? I'm getting better at my crimping. Still not a pro, but better. Here's the recipe. Thank you, Betty Crocker.

Look - see, Em and Cory are enjoying it.

And, so is Dad. He was the one that affectionately coined it "pearberry."

Here's all of us after our tummies are quite full.

For the rest of the weekend we just shopped, played and shopped some more.

Em and Mom while having lunch.

Playing on main street.

And . . . one last picture to show you that Scout was probably having the best weekend of us all. Cory and Em spoiled him like one of their own. He was quite smitten with them.