Prep Your Pumpkin Pie Early For An Easy, Low-Stress Thanksgiving Dessert

Pumpkin pie is a dessert so good it's been made in some form or another since colonial times. Whether you're DIY-ing your own pumpkin pie spice or upgrading your trusted pie recipe with some black pepper from the spice rack, the dessert is a staple on dinner tables during the holidays. But what do you do if your kitchen on Thanksgiving resembles the one on "The Bear," even before you start baking anything? You could always buy a readymade pie from the store or a farmstand, but perhaps you take pride in making things yourself. Well, worry not: By preparing your pie ahead of time and putting it in the freezer, you can make your Thanksgiving prep that much easier.

Just bake your pie in advance and stick it in the freezer. This way, you can keep it there for up to a month before you serve it. That means you can make your pie sometime in October, wait for Thanksgiving to roll around, and defrost it ahead of the big day. It's a good idea to put it in the fridge to thaw over the course of about twelve hours, so make sure you get on that at the right time — but once you do, you should be as good as gold.

Now, there are a few things to keep in mind when you're about to freeze pumpkin pie — or just about any pie, for that matter, whether you're making apple pie using a bit of culinary destruction or Alton Brown's beloved pecan pie. For one thing, once you're done baking it, you're going to want it to cool the pie completely before you put it in the freezer. If it's still warm, the moisture in the pie will freeze, messing with the smooth consistency of the pumpkin filling.

You'll also want to wrap it up tightly, in plastic and/or aluminum, before labeling it with the date of the day you baked it. That way, you'll know exactly how long it's been in the freezer, which means you'll know exactly when it's ready to thaw and serve. Maybe you might find it a bit of a hassle, but it's a lot less of a hassle a month ahead of time than it would be on Thanksgiving, we can tell you that right now.