What is Spring or Summer without delicious mint tea?!….Some call it garden tea, Some call it meadow tea, some call it creek tea. Whatever you call it tea, would you like a glass of tea with me?

Do you know what is more refreshing than a pretty glass of mint tea? A glass of mint tea sweetened with stevia instead of all that sugar!😛 I really like the Now brand of Stevia Glycerite for drinks. 2 teaspoons nicely sweetens one gallon. If you are used to having it really sweet, you can try 2 1/2 teaspoons. And there is no bad aftertaste! I do not mind my family drinking a lot of this tea because they’re not drinking sugar tea. Reece slurps his down like it’s an emergency when I fill his sipper cup!

I do not have measurements for my tea and I’m guessing most of my readers know how to make this tea too, without specific directions…. I brew a batch of tea about like this for one gallon. Fill with ice and water and sweetner. A refreshing taste of summertime!!

Jerald enjoys a good pie. One of his favorites would be Custard. A plain, simple, easy pie. I certainly can’t complain on it being too much work to make it for him! Especially when you have crusts in the freezer! I buy my crusts from our local bulk food store. I’m just not a crusty person! 😜 And when you can buy beautiful, flakey crusts at a very reasonable price, why not? It simplifies things for this mom, especially since we don’t eat a large quantity of pies.

And so it is I find myself, often on a Saturday, thinking what could I make for Sunday dessert? I like to make a dessert for Sunday because Sunday is a special day! Custard pie fits the bill at any given time. Especially if I want to surprise my man!

So this is how you make it. First, you dash out to the freezer and remove one of the pie crusts and let it thaw. It doesn’t take long, so you can immediately begin making the filling. Turn oven to 415*. Heat 2 1/2 cups of milk to scalding. While its heating, crack 4 eggs in a small bowl and whisk them up with 1/2 cup raw sugar, (or less) 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. By then the milk should be scalding but not burned yet. If you have a baby, it’s easy to forget things like heating milk temperatures, and thus you end up with burned milk. In that case, discard the milk and heat some more. Unless, of course, you like a burned flavor and black flakes in your pie, you can still use the same milk. So now add the very warm milk to the egg mixture and whisk it all up real nice. Pour it in the crust which by now will be thawed. Or maybe even over thawed because you had to change the baby’s diaper, hang out a load of laundry, and tend to your other screaming offspring. After it’s in the crust, sprinkle it lightly with cinnamon. If your young cook is helping, they will want to sprinkle the cinnamon which will get an overdose, but that is ok. Cinnamon is healthy and the pie still tastes good. If you have time and energy left, it’s lovely to drop in a few raspberries on top. (Fresh or frozen) Or even a few thin slices of fresh peaches. And oh yes I need to mention! This makes a tad more than one pie, so you just pour that extra filling into a small dish to bake. Very gently now, with no toddlers bumping you, set the pie in the oven along with the small dish of custard filling. Bake for 15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350* for another 25 to 30 minutes. If your unsure if it’s finished, you can slide a table knife in the center to see if it comes out clean, then it should be done. As soon as the small dish of custard is cool, sneak into the bathroom or another private room to eat it by yourself. It’s a small reward for all the effort it took to make a simple pie!!

I never knew my Grandpa Kurtz, but Mom would always say that when he ate pie he’d say “pie without cheese is like a kiss without a squeeze.” 😍😍