Tales of the Domestically Challenged: Pumpkin Pie

This is not my pie. My pie looked similar but that's about it.

There are at least two pie queens in my family: one I am related to by blood (a pumpkin pie queen to be specific) and the other (her children ask for birthday pies instead of cake) through marriage. These two women are so exceptionally gifted at the art of the dessert pie that I have not truly forayed into pie making.

It's not that I'm intimidated (okay maybe a little) but the whole construction of most pies makes me want to claw my eyes out. The rolling of dough, the pinching, cutting, and latticework that tops a lot of pies looks to me like torture. That scene from Disney's Snow White pops into my head with Snow's smug little face and voice while the precious woodland creatures help her efficiently create a perfect pie. No wonder the Queen wanted Snow White dead, no one could live up to that caliber of domesticity. I bet the Queen was sick of her husband crowing around the castle about how Snow's baking was sooooo exceptional she just wanted to shut the both of them up for good.

I haven't even made sugar cookies in over a year because about halfway through the seemingly endless creation I get restless and chuck the dough into the trash rather than suffer through another dozen little cats or whatever. So why with that sort of bad attitude, and that special blend of mediocrity and impatience only I can bring to the kitchen, did I get it into my head to try baking pumpkin pies? It's not something I fully understand but can perhaps explain.

The pressure to be less wasteful with the food we buy has to be a part of it because the very first pumpkin pie I made was with a Halloween jack o' lantern. The other part must have been how easy the pie seemed to me: roast the hell out of a smashed up pumpkin, pull off rind, dump in spices, puree it, dump in crust, and bake. Note: I did not make my own crust I bought one because I figured if I was going through the trouble to divert a pumpkin from a landfill we could indulge in some partially hydrogenated crust. Now that first pie I baked was perfect: everything about it hummed with sheer awesome I bet you that mothereffer came out of the oven bathed in a golden light. The consistency, sweetness, and color of the pumpkin goop was as delectable if not better than what you can buy at the store.

Every pumpkin pie I have made (about six) since that inaugural one has failed miserably, the goop was grainy and bitter, and I don't know what I'm doing wrong or what I did right that first time. Even the roasting process has been taxing. The only thing that has changed is the pumpkins I have purchased. Upon the urging of the Internet in general I started buying smaller pie specific pumpkins because jack o' lantern pumpkins are supposedly bland and grown to astronomical sizes strictly for carving purposes.

Are the pumpkins past their prime? Did I need to adjust the ratio of seasonings to goop? Can the squirrels or perhaps the creature David found in our attic that he originally thought was a mole but was actually a shrew help me with the next pie I bake? And if they are so damn good at baking they can do it all by themselves for all I care.