With Valentine’s Day coming up we thought we’d go a slightly different route to the normal “chocolate everywhere!” Not that we don’t love chocolate, but it’s nice to have variety in the kitchen, right? This week we’re putting together a butterscotch pretzel pie. You can make this as a surprise for someone or you can make it with them for a sweet way to spend time together.
Ingredients
Crust
¾ cup pretzel crumbs
¾ cup graham cracker crumbs
2 Tbsp granulated sugar
6 Tbsp (or ¾ stick) butter, melted
For the crust, you can alter amounts of pretzel to graham cracker crumbs if you want the crust sweeter or saltier.
Filling
¾ cup packed dark brown sugar
¼ cup cornstarch
Pinch of salt
3 large egg yolks- room temperature
2 cups of whole milk
2 Tbsp cold butter, cut into small chunks
2 tsp vanilla extract
Topping
1 cup cold heavy cream
3 Tbsp granulated sugar
Chocolate shavings
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350
Making the Crust:
In a medium bowl combine the pretzel crumbs, graham cracker crumbs, granulated sugar, and melted butter until they form an evenly moist, crumbly mix. Press the mixture evenly onto first the bottom and then up the sides of a 9-inch pie plate. Starting with the bottom is to make sure there aren’t any air pockets later. Bake until the crust is fragrant and firm, 8-10 minutes. Set aside to cool, although not in the fridge, or things will get soggy.
Making the Filling:
In a medium bowl, whisk together the brown sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Add the egg yolks and ½ the cup of milk, whisking thoroughly to combine.
In a large saucepan, bring the remaining 1 ½ cups milk to a boil over medium-high heat. Remove the pan from the heat. Whisking constantly, very slowly add the hot milk into the egg mixture. It should be a thin ribbon while you’re pouring. Keep whisking constantly so that you don’t scramble the eggs.
Pour the entire mixture back into the pan.
Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until the mixture comes to a boil and thickens, roughly 3-5 minutes. Remove from the heat and whisk in the butter and vanilla until smooth.
Pour the filling into the cooled pie crust and smooth the surface with a small spatula. Cover the surface entirely with plastic wrap to prevent a skin from forming. Make sure the plastic wrap is right up against the filling.
Place the pie in the fridge until thoroughly cooled and set, at least 2 hours.
Just before serving, make the topping.: In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment or using a handheld mixer, whip the cream and granulated sugar at medium-high sped to form soft peaks.
Spread the whipped cream over the pie, shave chocolate over the pie and serve. Be prepared for people to be coming after you for the recipe afterwards, this pie is sweet, delicious and absolutely amazing.
Tips
When it comes to making crumbs, your best bet is to get two gallon size ziplock bags. The first one will almost certainly get torn apart by the salt and the sharp edges of the pretzels, while the second will keep the crumbs from getting all over your counter. Pour in two cups of pretzels and mash with a rolling pin, or with a mallet.
If you’re short on time, you can get away with using a premade graham cracker crust, but it won’t taste quite the same. Because of how sweet the filling is, the salt from the pretzels balances things out. What you can do though to add that is a sprinkling of sea salt over the topping before you add the whipped cream.
When it comes to brown sugar, you need to work in stages. Fill the measuring cup you’re using and then scrape it off with a knife to level it. Now use your fingers or the back of a spoon to pack down the sugar. You should have roughly half of what you started with. Repeat until you have the amount you need.
When you’re adding in the milk to the egg mixture you’re tempering the eggs. If you ensure that your eggs are at warm temperature before you start working with them, it will help to prevent them from scrambling when you add in the milk. If you want to learn more about tempering you can check out here. You can watch the full episode, or start at 2:17 to learn just about tempering.
Let us know how your recipe turns out, we’d love to hear from you over on our Facebook page.
And if you’re looking to learn more about how we can help you with your appliances, please let us know.
Adapted From: Paula Deen’s Southern Cooking Bible.