A Holiday Recipe for Making Memories

I did not know this.

I bought the "ready-to-go" kind, but I thought it was concentrate. I thinned it with milk.

My pies were runny.

Not just runny.

My pies were lakes of pumpkin soup.

My nephew "ate" his piece of pie by vacuuming it off his plate with a straw.

The Vietnamese are very respectful, and nobody laughed. But there was too much conversation in Vietnamese at pie time, so I knew I was in trouble.

But good news. One of the lasting traditions of Vietnamese life is this: On holidays, everyone takes food to their neighbors. So I suggested to my wife that we take a pie across the street and palm it off on the neighbors. I could see in my wife's face that she didn't want to go on this dingbat mission to give a lame pie to trusting neighbors, but she is Vietnamese. Vietnamese women will support their men. So, pie in hand and smiling all the way, we started across the street. I rang the doorbell and explained that the pie was somewhat runny, so I had frozen it, and I thought his kids would appreciate a little Thanksgiving pumpkin pie from his Vietnamese American neighbors.

Our neighbor accepted the pie graciously, and I was delighted.

Then he ruined my day.

Before he closed the door, he said: "I am especially happy, because I am the pastry chef at the White House, and I never get to taste other people's pie!"

Three hundred million Americans, and when I try to rid the household of a questionable pie, the recipient turns out to be the pastry chef at the White House.

As we headed home, my wife said all she needed to say. Two words: "Proud now?"

-- John E. Carey, Falls Church