Man, I love pie. It is sort of my favorite holiday thing. I can do without chocolate (yes, I, know.. sacrilege), I can do without ice cream. I don't really miss cakes, and can mostly live without cookies. But pumpkin pie in the fall is something I really do miss. Of course, pumpkin pie traditionally has not just sugar and gluten but lots of dairy as well, so it has been a no-go for me for decades. The great thing about making your own pie is that you can control the ingredients and, at the end of the day, pies don't have to be super unhealthy if you keep the sugar low and use fresh, organic ingredients. I also figured out how to make a killer fresh apple pie this year, but that will have to wait for another post.
I have been trying for years to make a really good GF/ DF pumpkin pie. I think this year I finally succeeded, and it was SO much easier than recipes I had tried in the past. The great thing about pumpkin pie, is that it does not have to be super unhealthy. I mean, pumpkin is squash right? And if you don't dump a bunch of sugar in the pie, where is the bad?
Homemade pie crust will ALWAYS be better than a frozen crust. Frozen crusts always come out fairly hard instead of delicate and flaky. However, I am insanely busy, don't have a lot of time for cooking, and let's be honest, making a pie crust from scratch takes time. I opted for frozen gluten free crusts that I could get at the health food store. If you go this route, you do have to double check that these pre-made crusts do not have milk added. Some GF flour mixes inexplicably contain powdered milk (as if most gluten sensitive folks are not also dairy sensitive)...
I am NOT providing a recipe for gluten free pie crust - you will have to find that elsewhere if you want to make your own. Your pie will be better for it.
This is NOT keto, it is almost, but not quite paleo, and it does contain eggs.
So here it is:
Dr. B's GF/ DF Pumpkin Pie
Preheat oven to 450 degrees F
Ingredients
1 frozen GF/ DF pie crust
1-2 can (15 oz) organic pumpkin puree, drained **
2 medium or large eggs
3/4 to 1 cup of full fat coconut milk
1/3 to 1 cup of sucinat, coconut sugar or minimally processed sugar of your choice
1 tsp vanilla
Spices to taste, I recommend:
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger powder
1/2 tsp allspice
1/8 tsp clove powder
1/8 tsp fresh nutmeg
(if you are less ambitious, you can use 2-3 tsp pumpkin pie spice mix)
Instructions
Put all the ingredients into a food processor and blend
Pour into the frozen crust
Put it in the pre-heated oven
Bake at 450 for 15 min
Reduce heat to 350 and bake for 40 more minutes or until a knife comes out clean.
Cool and enjoy. It is best after it has been refrigerated.
FYI, you can now get non-dairy whipped cream, as well as non-dairy ice cream. Both are excellent with this pie.
**Note on texture
Ideally pumpkin pie is thick and dense. If your pumpkin puree is too watery, or you use jumbo eggs, you can get a pie that has a more custard like consistency. Still delicious, but it isn't quite the same. To avoid making a pumpkin custard pie, I have started straining the pumpkin puree every time. Straining some of the water out of the pumpkin puree yields a super dense, non-custard pie. I have found that canned pumpkin puree varies in water content a LOT from can to can. Straining most of the water out sometimes reduces the volume to 1/2 of the original - in those instances I will use 2 cans of pumpkin puree.
I put the puree into a nut milk bag, cheese cloth lined colander, or muslin Greek yogurt strainer and hang it over a container or the sink to drain for about an hour, then give it a squeeze to get the extra water out. I squeeze the water out until it stops coming out as a stream (only drops) and the puree has a paste like consistency. If you get it too dry you might have to add a bit of the pumpkin juice back in (tablespoon by tablespoon) as you blend. You need it to be moist/ loose enough for all of the ingredients to incorporate using the food processor.