Cooking
Especially Melissa Clark’s brandied pumpkin pie, a New York Times Cooking classic with five stars and over 2,000 reviews.
I’ll come right out and say it: I love pumpkin pie. I know this seasonal treat has its detractors, but it’s only because they’ve never had a good pumpkin pie. And I get it. A wan pumpkin pie — one without enough spiced oomph in its filling and a bland, stodgy crust — is just an aboveground pool of sugary squash mush.
If you are pumpkin pie-skeptical, I have a recipe for you: Melissa Clark’s brandied pumpkin pie, a New York Times Cooking classic with five stars and over 2,000 reviews. You can make it with canned pumpkin purée, but, as Melissa writes, roasted butternut squash is the move here. “Thin-skinned and easy to cut, butternut squash turns soft and velvety if you roast it,” she writes, “and a quick whirl in the food processor or a blender quickly reduces to it to a luscious purée.” Swap the brandy for bourbon if you like, and increase the cinnamon and ginger if you want more spice in your slice. “This pumpkin pie was the best we’ve ever made,” writes AM, a reader. “Complex flavors, not your everyday pie.”
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Brandied Pumpkin Pie
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Another good thing about pumpkin pie is that it can be made quite cheaply, especially if, like me, you stuff your freezer full of butter when it goes on sale. Our associate editor Margaux Laskey has compiled a helpful list of 17 ways to save money on Thanksgiving, with a tip for snagging a free turkey: “Many grocery store chains offer free turkeys if you spend a certain amount of money in a set time period. Sometimes, they’ll even run this same offer if you buy a ham. If that’s the case, roast your turkey for Thanksgiving, and freeze your ham for Christmas. Two birds (or a bird and a ham), one stone.”
Speaking of turkey: Eric Kim has a gorgeous new recipe for a dry-brined turkey with chiles. If “chiles” gives you pause, know that Eric’s bird is more assertively seasoned than flat-out spicy, balancing the heat with savory cumin and refreshing mint. He calls for a mix of fresh peppers to confit in the turkey drippings — Cubanelles, shishitos, poblanos, bells and jalapeños — so pick the peppers you prefer. You can watch Eric make his turkey here:
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