Pumpkin Pie
For Pumpkin lovers there might be nothing more delicious than Pumpkin Pie - sweet yet not too sweet it has the perfect balance of tastes. Making a Pumpkin Pie at home is not only easy but also really fun. It is also a perfect pie for lazier cooks or for those who don’t have that much time as instead of making the short crust and pumpkin purée yourself you can buy them both and save yourself some time. If you decide to buy everything the recipe will only take you around 15 Min prep time.
We of course suggest you make everything yourself even though the short crust can sometimes be tricky and doesn’t always come out perfectly as it is so delicate (you really must work with ice cold water and very cold butter) - so we also suggest you buy a short crust just to have it in case something goes wrong. If you decide to use store bough short crust we still recommend to make the pumpkin purée yourself as it is quite easy and the taste is much better than store bought purée.
For the Pumpkin Pie you can also play around with various spices: we suggest cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger but you can also add cardamom and clove - and yes there is also something called Pumpkin Pie Spice which might make your life even easier!
We hope you enjoy our Pumpkin Pie!
Prep Time: 1 Hour
Cooking Time: 1 Hour 10 Minutes
Ingredients for Pie Crust (Alternatively you can use store bought pie crust)
Butter (cold straight from the fridge) - 100 gr
Ice cold water - 50 gr
All-purpose Flour - 200 gr
Salt - a pinch
Sugar - 30 gr
Ingredients for Pie
Eggs 2 + 1 additional egg yolk
Small/Medium Sized Pumpkin (Sugar Pumpkin Should be used)
Brown Sugar - 120 gr
Cinnamon (ground) - 2 teaspoons
Ginger (ground) - 1 teaspoon
Nutmeg (ground) - 1 teaspoon
Lemon - Zest from half lemon
Salt - half a teaspoon
Heavy Cream - 170 gr
Ingredients if you don’t want to make the pumpkin purée or the crust yourself
400 gr Pumpkin Purée - can be purchased here
Pie Crust of your choice (brisè works best)
Preparation for pie crust:
We start preparing the pie crust by mixing together the flour, salt, until they are homogenously mixed. If you have a food processor you can definitely use it for this part, if not a good old mixer will do.
Start slowly adding chunks of cold butter and keep mixing. The mixture will be a bit chunky and this is normal, keep mixing and keep adding the butter until you have added it all.
At this point you can start adding some ice cold water - add one table spoon at a time and keep mixing until you feel like the mixture is coming together (this should be achieved after around 4/5 table spoons. The dough should hold together, if not, add more water (try not to go over 7 tablespoons).
Work the dough a little with your hands on a clean surface and see if it breaks easily or not - if it does maybe a little more water needs to be added. Do not knead it as you would usually do with other doughs as it might become too tough.
Make a little oval shape with the dough - it’s normal if you see pieces of butter still intact in the dough, these will later melt. Wrap the dough in wrap and place it in the fridge for an hour (you can leave it for up to 48 hours).
This step will be done only after you have finished your filling
Once the dough has been in the fridge long enough take it out and let it rest outside for around 10 min.
Start rolling the dough on a clean surface after sprinkling some flour (add some more flour if you see that the dough is too sticky) Roll the dough until it is around 4/5 mm thick. To roll out your short crust pastry you can use rolling pins that can be filled with water and ice, so as not to overheat the dough or place them in the fridge before using them.
Once you have rolled the dough you can place it in a 22 cm baking tray.
Preparation for pie filling:
The most important step for the pumpkin pie is the pumpkin purée. The pumpkin purée can either be bought or made from scratch (which is the tastier alternative). To make it from scratch, cut a medium-small pumpkin in half. Take out the insides and throw them away or keep the seeds to roast them later. Take a baking sheet with foil and put the pumpkin halves cut side down on the baking sheet and bake at 180°C until you can easily pierce them (depending on the oven and the size of the pumpkin this can take from one hour to one hour and a half),
Take the pumpkin out of the oven, let it cool and scoop out all the delicious pumpkin.
Keep your oven on and turn it up to 220°C
Now that we have the pumpkin purée we can start beating the eggs in a bowl with a mixer, add in the brown sugar, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, lemon zest and ginger. Add in the cream and afterwards also the pumpkin purée we made earlier and mix everything together well.
Now you can work your dough and once it is ready pour the pie filling onto the crust pastry you have placed on a 22 cm baking tray. Bake for 10 min at 220°C.
After the 10 min are done lower then temperature to 180°C and make for another 50 minutes. You can always do the toothpick test to see if when you poke the pie it comes out almost dry but a little moist.
Let the pie rest for 2 hours before serving - this is super important as the pie will be puffy and warm after baking and what we want is an unpuffed delicous cool pie.
After the 2 hours you can either eat the pie or store it in the fridge (for up to 3 days).