But I would be proud to partake in your...

Pecan Pieeee!

Chocolate pecan pie to be exact. *gracefully receives "ooh"s and "aah"s from the peanut gallery. A-thank you, a-thank you*

Here's a little back story:

I had such a wonderful weekend. I took off work on Friday because my wonderful mom came to visit! We spent the weekend shopping, eating at awesome restaurants around DC (Seventh Hill, Co Co Sala, and Chef Geoff's to name a few), and of course made a stop at the incredible Georgetown Cupcake. We always have the best time when she's in town, and I'm always sad to see her go. So she left this morning, and I was admittedly a little mopey. What better to lift my spirits than baking?!

I started off with a pie crust recipe that I got from a cooking class at Hill's Kitchen. It's a Butter/Shortening pie crust that creates nothing short of heaven. Any other day I would post it here, but it's so involved and so tricky, that I would just recommend looking up a recipe on your own, and working through it. Pie crust seems to be a tricky beast to tame, and while it's been edible the two times I've made it, it's a serious science to figure out the consistency of the perfect crust.

Here's my step by step process for tonight's baking fun:

First: Make the dough!

Would ya look at that pretty little dough ball? Well after I let it sit in the fridge for 2 hours (it needs at least 30 minutes to chill) I rolled it out to find an extremely cracked hunk of dough. Lucky for me I had that handy-dandy glass of water there to help me. I have found, also, that this little baby makes pie dough a piece of cake...well...a piece of pie at the very least:

Meet my mean, green, dough making machine:

This little baby makes cutting butter and shortening into flour a cinch. No forks, no knives, just pulse! It's a beauty, and I doubt I'd be as adventurous about making pie if I didn't have it.

Next I followed Paula Deen's recipe for Chocolate Pecan Pie and used some adorable little mini fall cookie cutters that my mom got me this weekend from Hill's Kitchen. Seriously, if you haven't been to that store here on the Hill, it's just awesome. If you like cooking the tiniest bit, you will *love* this store! Here's what I ended up with (pre-baked):

How cute are those little leaves?! And here's what it looks like post-baked:

HA! Just kidding, I didn't eat the whole thing...just a slice. Bringing it to work tomorrow, though, because leaving it in my house is a dangerous dangerous thing!

Hope you all have a Happy Monday!