Chocolate pie

My husband loves this chocolate pudding pie so much he has had it instead of cake for his birthday since he was a child. Not fancy, this is rich, chocolatey comfort food.

Ingredients

• Single pie crust for deep-dish pie
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1/3 cup cornstarch
• Pinch salt
• 3 ounces unsweetened chocolate (my mother-in-law always uses Baker’s)
• 3 cups milk
• 3 egg yolks
• 1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 tablespoon butter

Directions

1. Place pie crust in a 9″ or 9 1/2″ deep dish pie pan. Use a fork to poke holes in the crust. To keep the pie crust from puffing up during baking, place a sheet of parchment paper or aluminum foil in the bottom of the pie pan and add pie weights (or a healthy sprinkling of dried beans or rice) to weigh down the paper/foil. Bake according to directions and leave out to cool.
2. In a medium saucepan, add sugar, cornstarch and chocolate. Use whisk to stir cornstarch into sugar.
3. Have egg yolks ready in a small bowl. Save egg whites if you want to make a meringue topping (see notes).
4. Add milk to saucepan, stirring, and cook over medium heat. When mixture is warm, take some out (~1/2 cup) and mix with the egg yolks. Slowly add egg milk mixture back to the saucepan, stirring well.
5. Continue to cook mixture until it thickens. Turn to low and stir until chocolate melts fully and blends into pudding. Take care stirring, as the pudding will pop hot bubbles as it cooks.
6. When chocolate is fully melted, turn off heat. Add vanilla and butter and stir until butter melts.
7. Pour into prepared pie crust. Cool on countertop (this is the time to make meringue, if using). Chill in refrigerator until serving.

Notes

• If you don’t have a deep dish pie pan, you can simply eat the leftover filling as chocolate pudding.
• The pie works with whole, lowfat or skim milk.
• If you don’t have anything to weigh down your pie crust, you can also put the pie crust in the freezer for 10 minutes before baking. This should reduce the puffing.
• My husband prefers his chocolate pie with ice cream, but it does seem so perfect to use the three leftover egg whites to make a meringue for the pie. I tried this recipe from allrecipes.com, which I think would have worked well if I had baked it properly when the pie was still warm.

Here’s a link back to the post and pictures.