We were invited over for dinner last night by our new friends Chris and Renee. Since they were providing the food, I offered up the dessert. Key lime pie! The perfect island dessert. Cool, sweet, tart, delicious. Little did I know that this 7 ingredient dessert would end up being the most expensive pie I’ve ever made.

It seemed like an easy enough task. Like I said, there’s only 7 ingredients in the entire dessert, including the crust, filling, and topping. The whole pie takes less than 30 minutes to make. What I didn’t realize is that, living on an island, I’d have to go to 3 different stores to find all 7 of those ingredients, and prices were much higher than I’m used to. $3.50 for the tiniest bag of the tiniest key limes I’ve ever seen. $8 for a small container of heavy whipping cream. $5 for a can of condensed milk. It might not seem like things cost that much more, but the extra dollar or two per item really adds up on a routine grocery trip. Not to mention the extra 2 hours spent driving around to 3 different stores…

To top it all off, our fully furnished apartment is lacking in some essential kitchen gadgets, so add to the list a hand mixer, pie tin, and citrus juicer (which turned out to be an awesome little tool!)

Dinner turned out to be delicious. Chris made fresh guacamole with local avocados and chicken tacos with homemade taco shells and all the fixins. The key lime pie was the perfect finish to a great meal. All in all, this one key lime pie ended up costing me over $50. But boy was it worth it. Good friends, good food, good fun, and… good pie. I wouldn’t change a thing. 🙂