Today is Thanksgiving so Happy Thanksgiving to everyone who's celebrating. It's mainly celebrated in America as a way of giving thanks for the harvest of the year. There are lots of traditional foods associated with Thanksgiving such as roast turkey and trimmings, pumpkin pie, pecan pie and sweet potato pie. My friend is hosting a Thanksgiving party tonight and I offered to make a pumpkin pie for the occasion.
I bought a tin of pumpkin puree from America and it has a recipe on the back which I loosely followed. I added in some elements of a recipe on
joyofbaking.com. I used my mum's recipe to make the crust and filled the base with crushed, roasted pecan nuts and ginger biscuits which hopefully gives added crunch, texture and flavour to the pie and prevents a soggy bottom as it will absorb the moisture of the filling. I added ground cinnamon, mixed spice and ground ginger to the filling. I managed to make a mini pumpkin pie as I had some leftover pastry and filling so I've already had a little taster and it tastes good. It does not have thepecan/ginger layer so I am curious to find out what that tastes like! The pumpkin pie itself has a lovely buttery crust with a smooth filling and a hint of spice. It's not overly sweet probably because I reduced the sugar amount but goes well with sweetened spiced cream. I'll update my blog later when I have photos of the sliced pie.
Happy Thanksgiving!
making the crust
adding spices to the egg and sugar mix
adding pumpkin puree
for the pecan/ginger base
smash into pieces
line tart tin with pastry
add a layer of pecan/ginger mix
add filling
freshly baked
crust looks good!
a slice of my mini pie
Update 29/11/13
My first pumpkin pie! It was a huge success at the party (phew!) Everyone thoroughly enjoyed it mainly because it was light and not overly sweet. You can just see the pecan/ginger biscuit layer but it did not really add to the texture or flavour - I will double the amount and pre bake it slightly next time to see if that helps. The sweetened spiced cream definitely paired very well with the pie.
Pie crust
200g plain flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
115g cold butter
2 - 3 tablespoons ice cold water
Topping for pie base (optional)
25g roasted pecans
25g ginger biscuits
Pie Filling
2 eggs
110g light brown sugar ( This is a reduced amount, would recommend 150g if you prefer a sweeter pie)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon mixed spice
1 can pumpkin puree
1 can evaporated milk
To Serve
300ml whipping cream
65g icing sugar, sifted
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- Make the pie crust sifting the flour and salt into a bowl.
- Cut butter into cubes and rub into the flour until it resembles bread crumbs.
- Slowly add water one tablespoon at a time until a dough forms.
- Shape into a ball and wrap in clingfilm.
- Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
- Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface and line a pie tin, pressing the corners into the tin.
- To make the pie base topping, place pecan nuts and ginger biscuits in a ziplock bag and bash with a rolling pin.
- Sprinkle the pecan and ginger biscuit mix over the base of the pie and press it down firmly. Place in the refrigerator to firm up.
- Preheat the oven to 190C.
- Make the filling by whisking the eggs and sugar together.
- Add the spices then the pumpkin puree and whisk.
- Finally stir in the evaporated milk.
- Pour the filling into the prepared pie crust and bake for 45-50 minutes.
- The crust should be brown on the edges and the filling should be set with a slight wobble in the middle.
- Insert a sharp knife or palette knife into the filling and it should come out clean.
- Allow to cool completely.
- Pour whipping cream into a bowl and whisk until it just holds its shape. Add in sugar and cinnamon and continue whisking until it's a spreadable consistency.
- Decorate with spiced whipped cream and pecan nuts.
I enlarged and printed a picture of Peppa Pig that I found on the internet to use as my template 
I made a double recipe and baked 1 round and 1 square cake 
Using the picture as a guide, I cut out the head 
and the body 
covered in chocolate buttercream and placed in the fridge to set 
I used the pic as a guide to cover the board with fondant 
I used blue fondant for the sky and green for the grass. I cut some cloud shapes using white fondant and rolled out 2 white circles for her eyes. The pupils are edible black icing as I didn't have any black fondant 
The 'muddy puddle' is made of chocolate icing and I cut out the shape of the number 2 to place on her body 
The finished product
making cake pops 
I forgot to shape the ears! oops!
I decided to try out my new food coloring markers that I bought from America 
However, it didn't work well on the cake pops so I ended up using writing icing for some of them 
Not brilliant but it passes for a pig! 
