Thanksgiving Pie: Sugarless Honey Pumpkin Pie

Contrary to my earlier pieatus announcement, I wound up making a pumpkin pie for thanksgiving. Here it is, honey-sweetened, sugarless and tasty. Also featured today: photos of Carolyn's cherry pie, with some photos of crust edge shaping and foil top-protecting.

I found the recipe here:

http://www.pumpkinrecipes.org/honey-pumpkin-pie.html

and it was pretty easy (much simpler and quicker than the Cooks Illustrated one I made last time).

Here it is, in case the linked site changes. Note that I used Carolyn's technique for the pie crust.

Ingredients:

2 medium eggs
½ cup honey
¾ teaspoon nutmeg
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon powdered ginger
1 ½ cups pureed cooked pumpkin
¾ cup milk
One prepared pie shell

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450°F.
2. In a large bowl, beat eggs until yolks and whites are well blended. Gradually beat in honey until incorporated and thick. Add the nutmeg, cinnamon, salt and ginger.
3. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together pumpkin puree and milk. Pour into egg mixture, whisk until smooth, and pour into pie shell.
4. Bake 10 minutes, reduce temperature to 350°F, and continue baking 20 to 25 minutes, until filling is firm. Remove and cool before serving.

Using a borrowed pie pan, I discovered too late that I'd made only half as much filling as needed- so I doubled the above recipe, making a second batch of filling after pouring the first (with a resulting two-tone effect visible in the photos!)

One quirk of pumpkin pie seems to be that it doesn't seem nearly as firm when it first comes out of the oven as you'd like; but settles down to a nice firm texture after cooling. 

The sugarless pie was very tasty; with only honey to sweeten it, the pumpkin flavor and spices play a bit stronger role, which I think is pretty nice.

Carolyn made an amazing cherry pie with a lattice top, and a splendid peach cobbler, at the same time. Here's her work area:

 

Here's the filled pie:


Here are some closeups of her edge crimping technique:

Here's the baking pie, with a foil edge protector:

And here's her finished pie. It tasted as good as it looks. Which is to say, amazing.

 Lastly, here are the pies side by side.

Happy thanksgiving! Bring a little peace to the world in whatever way you can, folks, and cook something tasty while you're at it.