Sweet Potato Pecan Pie

Bake-a-thon 2014: Day 9

Bake of the Day: Sweet Potato Pecan Pie

I recently took a 'Pie making' class along with a dear friend at Chef Central. The class was the day before Thanksgiving and the 3 pies we brought back from the class were served for dessert on Thanksgiving day.

The crust is the foundation of any pie or tart. A good crust can enhance and elevate the resulting dessert. Conversely, a bad crust can make a wonderful filling lose its appeal. We learnt 3 different types of pie crusts: 3-2-1 Pie dough, Pâte sucrée and a simple cookie crust.

Today I'm posting the Sweet Potato-Pecan pie that we made with 3-2-1 pie crust. It is called 3-2-1 because the crust uses 3 parts flour, 2 parts butter and 1 part water by weight. It is very simple to make but care needs to be taken that the dough is not overworked, that will lead to tough pie crust. The filling is a combination of sweet potato filling and pecan pie filling.

Strangely the sweet potato filling tastes very similar to pumpkin filling. So I guess you can use canned pumpkin puree instead of the mashed sweet potato puree. The crust has not much sweetness, but it is well compensated with the sweet filling. The crust is flaky and the filling is creamy and nutty. A must try for all pie lovers.

Ingredients;
For the Pie Crust: 
All-purpose flour - 1¼cups

Salt - ½tsp
Sugar - ½tsp
Cold Unsalted Butter -  ½cup (1 stick), cut into pieces
Ice Water - ~¼cup

For the Sweet Potato-Pecan Filling:
Sweet Potatoes - 1lb. (about 2~3 medium)
Golden Brown Sugar - ½cup
Unsalted Butter - 2tbsp, melted
Vanilla extract - 1tbsp
Ground Cinnamon - ½tsp
Ground Allspice - ¼tsp
Salt - ¼tsp
Light Corn Syrup - ¾cup
Eggs - 2, large
Pecan halves - 1cup

Method:

• Make the Pie Dough: Place the flour, salt and sugar in the bowl of a food processor, and process for few times to combine.
• Add the butter pieces to the flour mixture and process for few seconds.
• Add the ice water in a slow, steady stream, through the feed tube until it forms a coarse meal. Turn the dough out onto a work surface, work with your hands to form a ball, press down to make a disk and wrap well with a plastic wrap.
• Place in the refrigerator for 1 hour or for up to 4 days.
• Prepare the Sweet Potatoes: Preheat the oven to 400°F. Wrap the sweet potatoes in foil and bake them until soft. When cool enough to handle, scoop the flesh out of the potatoes and mash until smooth. Measure about 1 cup mashed potato and put into the bowl.
• Make the Pie Crust: While the sweet potatoes are baking, prepare the pie crust. Dust the work surface with little flour to ensure dough doesn't stick to it.
• Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough in one direction, then pick it up, turn it 90° and roll in the opposite direction. This will ensure that the dough rolls out evenly and does not stick to the work surface. Keep dusting the work surface as needed. Roll out until the dough is between ¼"~⅛" thick and has reached the desired diameter -- just a bit larger than the pie plate you are using.
• Gently roll the dough over the rolling pin and transfer onto lightly greased pie plate. Pierce the crust with a fork all over. 
• Bake the pie crust in the same 400°F oven for ~8 minutes or until the crust is pale golden. Remove from the oven and set aside.
• Prepare the Fillings: To the mashed sweet potato, whisk in brown sugar, butter, vanilla, cinnamon, allspice and salt. Spread the sweet potato mixture in the prepared crust.
• Whisk corn syrup and eggs in a bowl to blend. Stir in pecans.
• Pour the pecan mixture over the sweet potato mixture. 
• Bake the pie until the filling is set, puffed and brown, about 45 minutes. Cool pie completely. Serve at room temperature or refrigerate for up 2~3 days and serve cold.

Linking this to this year's Bake-a-thon event.

An InLinkz Link-up