He enjoys his food enormously, likes variety and has a particular fondness for certain food preparations. Including, of course, various desserts that really please his palate. And he thought it would be lovely for me to bake a cream pie. Chocolate cream pie, coconut cream pie, butterscotch cream pie, he loves them all. I prefer a lemon meringue pie, and he likes those too, but not nearly as much as the others.

It has been years, actually, since I've baked a cream pie for him. When our children were young I would often bake those pies to finish a family meal. Our children have long since strode out into the world on their own. And he was feeling a little nostalgic for the sumptuous taste in his mouth of those long-ago-produced delectables.

So I agreed, and he chose above the others, to have a coconut cream pie. And that is what I set about doing. It is a three-stage operation which goes some way to explaining why it doesn't represent a favourite for me to produce, from my perspective. First, comes the crust, which must be pre-baked. I used the pie dish that our younger son had made for me, a pottery dish that never fails to produce a well-baked crust. I also used the wooden rolling pin that he had made for me decades earlier and which I prefer over all other of my implements.

Once the crust was baked and set aside to cool, the filling was prepared, cooked on the stove (milk, flour, sugar, egg yolks, butter, vanilla, shredded coconut) and then allowed to cool as well, before being ladled out into the baked pie crust. And then the egg whites were whipped to a thick, stiff froth, with a little granulated sugar and cream of tartar, then piled over the filling, from crust-edge to crust-edge. And additional coconut sprinkled over.

Then finally baked until the meringue was well browned. Voila!