I

have to begin by saying that I dislike coconut...well no, I hate

coconut.  My mom swears I

used to love it.  That is,

until I ate a whole coconut when I was five!  Having

this knowledge should help you appreciate the love I have for both

my mom and my nannie as I share my experience with coconut pie.

It was my

mom's birthday and I wanted to do something very

special.  So, of course, I called my nannie for a

little help.  "Oh, I know the

perfect thing!  Let's bake

your mom a coconut pie!", said my nannie. To which I quickly

replied, "Nannie, coconut is gross!"  Her reply was

simple, "But coconut is her favorite."

I decide

nannie was right and I needed to bake mom a coconut

pie.  Nannie and I had a blast baking in her kitchen

and reminiscing on our favorite memories.  Things were

going great. That is until it was time to open the bag of

coconut.  I said to myself, "Well it can't be that

bad, I don't have to eat any."

Oh was I

wrong.  As soon as I opened

the bag, the smell of coconut billowed out and I became a little

green around the gills...to say the least.  Nannie

looked at me with such pity. 

Of course she said she would finish for me, but I was determined

that I was going to conquer the coconut!

I managed to

finish the pie and was rather proud of myself.  So,

off to mom's work we went.  I

would love to say the trip was nice, nannie and I laughed more, but

that would be a lie.  Oh no,

the trip was torture...for both nannie and myself.

The smell of

the coconut consumed my small car.  I tried rolling

down my window, but that made it worse.  I tried the

windows in the back but that didn't help either.  The

only alternative was to roll down the window on nannie's side of

the car.  I must mention here that nannie hates to

have her window down because it bothers her eyes.  Not

knowing what to do, I pulled the car off to the side of the

road.  Nannie put on my 'larger than they need to be'

sunglasses and determined she was ready to complete the

mission!

As we walked

through the door into mom's workplace, sweet nannie smiled at me as

her hair, blown by the wind, stuck straight up on her

head.  Mom was surprised to see us, not because we had

the pie, but because of my green face and nannie's hair! After she

recovered from the shock of our appearance, mom realized we had

brought her the pie for her birthday.

As I stood,

well away from the smell, I smiled inside at the two amazing women

in front of me enjoying moms coconut pie.  Although

getting to this moment was quite eventful, it was well worth

it.

Nannie's

Coconut Pie Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white sugar

• "font-family: Symbol;"> 2

  tablespoons all-purpose flour

• 1/2 cup butter
• 3 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup flaked coconut
• 1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch single crust pie

Directions:

1. Mix flour with sugar. Cream in butter and eggs. Mix in vanilla

   and milk until well combined. Fold in coconut. Pour into prepared

   pie crust.

2. Use remaining coconut from bag and cover top of pie.
3. Bake at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) for one hour. Cool

   completely before cutting.