HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

I will be going to visit family for Thanksgiving, starting tomorrow, so I have been busy baking pies for the big day. That way, I will have the desserts made and on Thursday, I'll be able to focus solely on the dinner. Naturally, I made my classic low calorie pumpkin pie, this time with Stevia sweetener instead of Splenda. I've never baked with Stevia, so Thursday will be a bit of a new experience for me, too! Here's a shot of my pumpkin pie:

It's a little darker than in the past, but I used brown sugar for this pie instead of regular sugar, which does add a little more color. The recipe is here.

The other "pie" I made was a cranberry-apple crumble. I like fresh fruit desserts and this is one that is loaded with flavor, though far less calories than a traditional crumble.  I used about 2 lbs of peeled, chopped apples and 1 1/2 cups of cranberries for the fruit, tossing them with 1/2 cup sugar, 8 packets Stevia, 2 Tbs lemon juice, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp clove, and 1/2 tsp ginger. Pour the entire mix into a pie tin sprayed with nonstick spray, cover with foil and bake in a 375F oven for 45 minutes. To make the crumble, combine 1/4c flour, 1/2c brown sugar, 2 Tbs light stick margarine, and 1 tsp cinnamon. Blend margarine into the mix until crumbly and then add 1/4c quick cook oats. When the first 45 minutes is up, uncover the fruit and sprinkle the crumble on top. Return to oven and bake for another 20 minutes or until the crumble is golden brown. It looks like this:

I got the basic recipe from the ADA's book Diabetes Meals On $7 a Day -- Or Less! I recommend this book, as it has a number of very basic and easy recipes that can be modified without much work.

With my modifications, 1/9 of this recipe has 167 calories and approximately 32g of carbohydrates per serving -- only 4g carbohydrates more than the original! Personally, I would have half of the recommended serving or even less, so I could have a taste of that and a taste of the pie without blowing my blood sugars through the roof.

With that, let me say happy Thanksgiving to all my friends! Eat well and remember that even with diabetes, you can still eat deliciously!