Happy Thanksgiving, y'all.

Technically I am just in the nick of time with this: it might be half past midnight here, but it's still Thanksgiving in the USA. The lucky, lucky Yanks, with their fabulous day dedicated entirely to eating. No manic money spending, present buying and decorating, just a load of delicious food. I was all up for cooking up an American-themed storm to celebrate, but it just didn't happen this year. So, instead, I decided to bake a pecan pie. I remember when my brother (the second one - there are four of them - I am the youngest and only girl - which could potentially explain the huge appetite) first moved to New York he came home for Christmas with a pecan pie - I thought it was the most amazing, exotic concoction ever (listen kids, I'm from Longford and this was the early nineties. And it's a pie, always a valid reason for enthusiasm). Pecan pie hasn't quite seeped into our dessert culture quite like it has in the US, but I love the sweet nutty stickiness of it, and when I saw an easy peasy recipe in the Nigella Christmas book I thought I'd have a crack at it. It involved making a pastry base, and though I was tempted to Jus-Rol it up to the max, it was actually a speedy operation:

Then Nigella insisted on it going in the freezer; my freezer is in the shed (my kitchen is pretty tiny), but I dutifully trotted out there anyhow.

I managed not to stick my finger into this, which will be a source of great relief to all who have to eat it:

I was a little stressed when I felt it ripple under the golden pecans after I took it out of the oven, but I guess after it has set it will all be hunky dory. Anyhow, right now I am exercising great restraint in not taking a slice out of this gleaming pie of gorgeousness, as I am bringing it as my contribution to dinner in a friend's house tomorrow night:

But back to Thanksgiving. I had half entertained the notion of visiting my big bro and his family in West NY this year, as I do every year since the brilliant Thanksgiving I spent there a few years ago. Being utterly skinners, and having actually already been in NY earlier this year, I really couldn't justify it. But I am there, stuffing my face, in spirit.