Book-Inspired Baking

You won’t catch me bragging about my kids much around here, it kind of drives me crazy when people do that. But just this once I have to give my little guy a shout out, because he LOVES books and it just fills my heart with joy. I love reading with him, and I love that he’s starting to get old enough to want to read his books himself. He loves to read to the “class”, and he holds his books up to show the pictures and shushes all of the make-believe students, and it is just SO FREAKING ADORABLE!!! I love that kid.

One night this week were were reading Amelia Bedelia, which he is way too young to understand but enjoys anyway. (Classic book, btw. If you’ve got kids, especially aged 5-7, go check it out from the library!) Just about the only thing he could catch on to was when Amelia Bedelia made a pie, and Mr. Rogers (we call him Mr. Roberts, because my kid is also obsessed with Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood, and when we called him Mr. Roger’s he said “That’s not Mr. Rogers!”, and we figured just changing it was easier than arguing.) eats it and loves it. When he re-read it to himself, the only part he wanted to read was the part about the pie.

It was cute, until he looked at me and said “I want pie.” 

Well, crap. I don’t have pie. I offered him strawberries and apples and other things we usually eat for dessert, and he started to cry. So I did what any tired mom does to keep her kid from crying at the end of the day: I promised we could make a pie.

So that’s what we did today! We made pie. Not lemon meringue like Amelia Bedelia. Because first of all, that stuff is nasty, and second of all, I’m a terrible baker and I only know how to make two kinds of pie. Since it’s not fall, we skipped pumpkin and went for apple.

Oh my gosh, you guys! We had so much fun! Matthew is just getting to the age where he wants to help cook, and he had so much fun throwing the apple slices in the pot, and stirring, and dumping in the spices. And even though it’s high-maintenance, apple pie isn’t hard, so I had fun too.

The pie turned out great. This is only my third apple pie, and it’s the best one yet. I use this delicious recipe from William Sonoma, with the slight variation that I do all pink ladies because I don’t like grannie smiths. (Full disclosure, I also don’t make my own crust. Aint nobody got time for that! I buy frozen.) If you need a better recipe, I strongly recommend giving this one at try!

So have you ever done something because you read it in a book? What was it? Was it as awesome as you thought it would be?