Sweet sweet pumpkin pie
"Eh Mahhh! Get me some pahhhh!!"
I made pumpkin pie from the scoopings from my carved army of the night. I used an amended recipe that I found on Recipezaar, although it didn't specify what kind of tart base to use. It just said "an un-baked pastry shell". Apparently in the States you can actually BUY raw pastry cases and so on in the supermarket. Decadence...you'll find none of that here...we actually have to MAKE our own cases from scratch! Although I could have bought frozen supermarket pastry and just laid it in the pie dish, it's not the SAME. I usually disapprove of pre-made, pre-bought, which might not necessarily be a good thing, and might change when I no longer have the time and inclination to make my own pastry from scratch. But I hope not.
So I used a shortcrust pastry recipe from The Silver Spoon. That damn book has saved me many a time. Whatever I'm not sure about, The Silver Spoon will know. There is a simple and lovely recipe on page 1008. (Transcribed with my specifications).
Shortcrust Pastry No.1 from The Silver Spoon
I made pumpkin pie from the scoopings from my carved army of the night. I used an amended recipe that I found on Recipezaar, although it didn't specify what kind of tart base to use. It just said "an un-baked pastry shell". Apparently in the States you can actually BUY raw pastry cases and so on in the supermarket. Decadence...you'll find none of that here...we actually have to MAKE our own cases from scratch! Although I could have bought frozen supermarket pastry and just laid it in the pie dish, it's not the SAME. I usually disapprove of pre-made, pre-bought, which might not necessarily be a good thing, and might change when I no longer have the time and inclination to make my own pastry from scratch. But I hope not.
So I used a shortcrust pastry recipe from The Silver Spoon. That damn book has saved me many a time. Whatever I'm not sure about, The Silver Spoon will know. There is a simple and lovely recipe on page 1008. (Transcribed with my specifications).
Shortcrust Pastry No.1 from The Silver Spoon
- 1.5 cups (200g) plain flour
- 1/2 a cup (100g) caster sugar
- 100g unsalted butter ( I always use Western Star), softened and cubed
- 2 yolks
- grated rind of 1 lemon
- pinch of salt
Sift the flour and sugar into a bowl. 
Make a hollow in the mound and add butter, yolks, rind and salt. Mix with fingers till a doughy lump. I had to add a squeeze of lemon juice because my mix wouldn't bind properly. Throw the lump in a plastic bag and stick it in the fridge for half an hour or so. When you're ready to go, lay a sheet of baking paper over a pie dish and either roll out the dough to fit or just press bits into the dish. Trim the edges.
Make a hollow in the mound and add butter, yolks, rind and salt. Mix with fingers till a doughy lump. I had to add a squeeze of lemon juice because my mix wouldn't bind properly. Throw the lump in a plastic bag and stick it in the fridge for half an hour or so. When you're ready to go, lay a sheet of baking paper over a pie dish and either roll out the dough to fit or just press bits into the dish. Trim the edges. 
My Pumpkin Pie
- 1 to 1 and 1/2 cups cooked pumpkin mash, water squeezed out in a teatowel
- 1 cup milk
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup caster sugar
- about a tablespoon of melted butter or margarine
- 1 big teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger
- big pinch salt
Preheat the oven to 220 or 230 degrees celsius, mix all ingredients in a bowl and pour into pastry-filled pie dish as above. Mine took about an hour to cook until a knife in the centre came out clean, and I had to cover the pastry edges with foil after the first 2o minutes or so.
It's so delicious...vanilla and nutmeggy flavours combining in a rich, light-textured pumpkin pudding centre, surrounded by crisp tangy sweet pastry. It's not very good for me though, so I'll have to take most of it to work...or have a pie-eating party!
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