Pumpkin pie with maple cream

A simple – and tasty – way to use up the flesh hollowed out from carving Halloween pumpkins!

Preparation time:  Around 15 minutes

Cooking time:  Around 2 hours

This dish takes a while to cook, but for most of the time, you just stick it in the oven and forget about it, so it’s actually very low-effort.  You can either cook one large pumpkin pie, or you can try something a bit different and make individual pumpkin tartlets for your Halloween guests to enjoy!

Ingredients (1 pie):

• Pumpkin pieces – 550g, in chunks (I use the insides removed during pumpkin carving)
• Readymade shortcrust pastry – 500g pack (you can make your own if you insist!)
• Light muscovado sugar – 175g
• Cinnamon – 1 tsp.
• Ground nutmeg – 1 tsp.
• Ground ginger – ½ tsp.
• Ground cloves – ½ tsp.
• Double cream – 300ml
• Eggs – 2
• Maple syrup – 5 tbsp.

Method:

1. Heat the oven to 180C.  Put the pumpkin pieces in a microwavable bowl, cover with pierced cling-film, and cook on “High” for 15 minutes;
2. While the pumpkin pieces are cooking, roll the pastry out to about 5mm thickness and large enough to fit your pie dish.  Put the rolled pastry into the pie dish, line with greaseproof paper and baking beans, and blind bake for 15 minutes;
3. When the pumpkin pieces are cooked, drain them in a colander and leave them to cool;
4. When the pastry case has blind baked for 15 minutes, remove the greaseproof paper and baking beans, and trim the edges of the pastry, before returning it to the oven to blind bake for a further 10 minutes;
5. When the pastry case is done, turn the oven down to 140C.  Put the pumpkin pieces, sugar, spices, eggs and 150ml of the cream into a food processor and blend until smooth.  Pour the mixture into the pastry case, and cook in the oven for around 1-hour to 1-hour-20-minutes (wait for the mixture to look cooked in the centre, at which point it will puff up, before sinking again as it cools);
6. Remove the cooked pie from the dish and allow to cool.  In the meantime, add the maple syrup to the other 150ml of cream, and whip until stiff using electric beaters.  When ready to dish up, serve a slice of pumpkin pie (warm or cold, as you prefer) with a dollop of the maple cream;
7. Pumpkin Tartlets – As a variation, you can substitute the shortcrust pastry for around 40 individual bite-sized pastry cases (I go for ready cooked ones to save time).  Add around a tablespoon of the pumpkin mixture to each case, and cook in the oven (at the same temperature) for around 20 minutes.  When cooled, you can either dollop or pipe the maple cream on top for a Halloween themed party snack!

Pumpkin tartlets