MOTHER'S NO FAIL PECAN PIE

Anyone who knew my mother, knew she was a really good cook.  It probably came natural to her as her mother was a good cook also.  My grandmother cooked for the school I attended through the 9th grade.  I don't remember how many years, but I do remember that she was the cook.  My mother was the oldest girl and that meant helping out quite a bit at home.  I remember she used to talk about how her brothers gave her such a hard time about her biscuits.  (It took her awhile to perfect them....apparently they were pretty hard at first.)  Her other two sisters are also good cooks although they don't cook like they used to.

When I was growing up, we always lived in a "house trailer" a.k.a. mobile home.  Most of the time it was parked next to my daddy's service station.  Mother always said she regretted not teaching me to cook, but the kitchen was always small and there just wasn't enough room for her to teach me.  I guess I watched her a lot though, because after graduating from college and moving to FL to teach school, I managed to survive in the kitchen.  I'm not saying there weren't some flops, but I didn't make the same mistake twice.

One of those times was when my cousin, Carol, a.k.a "Sissy", came to visit me and we decided we were going to make my mother's "No Fail Pecan Pie."  Mother was known for her pecan pie and we believed we could make it without a problem.....afterall it was a "No Fail Pecan Pie".

We gathered all the ingredients and mixed them up.  The directions for the pie crust we were using said to prick the bottom so we used a fork and stuck that fork into the crust a bunch of times.  Then we poured the mixture into the crust.  That's when we realized that we had left out the margarine.  So we poured the mixture back into the bowl and added the margarine to the mixture.  Simple enough.  Then we poured the mixture back into the crust and put the pie in the oven to bake and waited.

I remember it looked good, looked like Mother's.  Then we cut it.  Well, we proved that Mother's "No Fail Pecan Pie" could fail.  The crust was between the filling and the nuts.  We had  pricked the crust so many times that the filling had seeped through the holes as it baked.  So our pecan pie was filling, crust, then nuts.  Do I need to say it didn't come out too well?  It tasted good though.  It just didn't look like Mother's did.

I never made that mistake again and I imagine my cousin Carol hasn't either.  So when you make Mother's No Fail Pecan Pie and use the premade pie crust, just prick it a few times.

Mother's No Fail Pecan Pie

1/2    cup sugar
1/4    cup margarine
1       cup white Karo syrup
1/4    teaspoon salt
3       eggs
1       cup chopped pecans (Mother always chopped her pecans...then it is so much easier to cut.  It still makes a pretty pie.)

Cream sugar and margarine together.  Add syrup and salt; beat well.  Beat in eggs, one at a time.  Add pecans.

Pour into pastry shell.

Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.