Gluten Free Pumpkin Pie

Since I have all of these homegrown pumpkins, it seemed a crime not to have pumpkin pie at our Thanksgiving dinner, so I added it to the menu.  My mom usually brings pecan and pumpkin pie, so I haven't had much practice making gluten free crust.  Even when I used to eat gluten, when I made pies I would use the Pillsbury pre made crust that I just had to roll out and put in the pan.  Then when I started eating gluten free, on the rate occasion that I made a pie, I'd use a mix.  Since I decided sort of late in the game that we should have pumpkin pie, I didn't have a mix on hand.

I thought it wouldn't be a problem because I knew that there was a pie crust recipe on my favorite go-to website for baking gluten free, gluten free pie crust .  I was happy to have all of the ingredients on hand and the recipe looked easy enough.  I made it a couple of days in advance and let it sit in the refrigerator until I was ready to roll it out.

The pie crust recipe consist of three kinds of gluten free flours, xanthan gum, salt, and water.  Part of the instructions say, "For a tender crust, pinch and rub the shortening into the flour with your fingers until the flour is the consistency of cornmeal.  If you want a flaky crust, then measure out your shortening and divide it into small pieces.  Freeze those pieces and then cut them into your dough.   You can use a pastry cutter or just press the thin pieces with your fingers.  You want the shortening to be visible and in thin, flaky pieces."  I rubbed the shortening and flour with my fingers, but it never became the consistency of cornmeal.  Instead, it became a sticky mess which coated my hands and fingers and I had to scrape it off with a butter knife.

I don't blame the recipe.  I blame my inexperience, but it did turn out OK.  I tasted it after I had it all mixed up and ended up adding three teaspoons of sugar to it because I just had to have a tiny bit of sweetness in my crust.

After a couple of days in the fridge, the pie crust rolled out just fine and I was able to use it for my pumpkin pie.

Then I got to looking at my pumpkin pie recipes and all of them had cans of evaporated milk in them.  I didn't have any of that in my pantry.  It's not something that I usually stock.  So, I googled "pumpkin pie without evaporated milk" and came up with this:

1 pastry for single-crust pie

2 eggs, slightly beaten

2 cups fresh pumpkin puree

1/4 cup half-and-half OR light cream OR regular milk

(I used 1/8 cup heavy cream and 1/8 cup goat milk)

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 Tbs. all-purpose gluten free flour (I used Bob's Red Mill)

1 tsp. vanilla

1/4 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg

1/8 tsp. ground allspice

1/4 tsp. ground ginger

Prepare and roll pastry for single-curst pie.

Line 9" pie plate with pastry.

Trim; crimp edges as desired (Martha Stewart's website has good ideas for this)

Stir together eggs, pumpkin, and milk/cream

Stir in sugar, flour, vanilla, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and allspice.

Pour pumpkin mixture into pastry.

To prevent over browning, cover edge of pie with foil for the first 10 minutes of cooking time.

Bake in 375 F oven for 25-30 minutes, or until knife inserted in center comes out clean.

Cook on wire rack.

Cover and refrigerate within two hours.

This pie was delicious.  Definitely a recipe to keep.  In fact, I'm going to throw out all of my other pumpkin pie recipes (well, except my Martha Stewart chocolate pumpkin pie, which I haven't tried yet).  Who needs evaporated milk?

The crust was delicious, too, and held together well, which is important for gluten free baking.