A failed calabasa pie

I bake this pie because I do not have enough filling to fill my 8-inch pie crust. So I have to mix up some filling at the last minute.

Recipe: Last minute pumpkin pie (one 8-inch pie)

Ingredients:
- 1.5 cup cooked calabasa, mashed
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/4 tp salt
- 1 tp Trader Joe's pumpkin pie spice
- half-and-half to top up the filling to 3 cups

Procedure:
1. Beat eggs separately. Mix everything.
2. Allow the filling to sit for a while. Skim off bubbles.
3. Pour into pie crust and bake at 425F for 15 minutes. Then cover crust edge and bake at 350F until edge of filling is set.

Results:
7:33pm, ingredients:

7:37pm, all ingredients mixed except half and half:

7:45pm, filling making up 2 cups:

7:45pm, filling beaten with an extra egg and more cream to make up 3 cups:

7:47pm, filling in 8-inch crust:

7:47pm, filling height in crust:

7:47pm, 8-inch pie to bake at 425F:

8:00pm, pie baked 10 minutes:

8:03pm, pie crust covered and baking resumed at 350F:

8:19pm, pie baked another 16 minutes:

8:22pm, baked crust:

8:33pm, pie crust and edge when just done:

8:37pm, comparison between this failure (left) and previous success (right):

9:17pm, cooled top:

9:17pm, cooled crust:

9:17pm, cooled crust details:

Overnight
Served:

Observations:
1. The most obvious reason of my failure is that I have not given the filling any time to sit. The bubbles in the filling expands when baking, causing the filling to become very coarse in texture. The pumpkin floats up onto the top.
2. What I find out in this experiment is that an 8-inch pie crust can take 3 cups of liquid.
3. It turns out that my guests are all very graceful and acceptance of my failure. They happily try it and compare it with the success. Then some of them say they actually like this pie more. It is more creamy and tender because this pie is made with half-and-half. The success pie is made with evaporated milk. This pie has less of the spices. So the flavor of milk stands out better.

A successful calabasa pie

I have learnt from my friend how to make pumpkin pie. This is, however, my first time doing it myself. I follow KAF's recipe. It gives me a great success.

Recipe: Pumpkin pie (1 10-inch pie)

Ingredients:
- One 10-inch single pie crust
- 2 cups cooked calabasa, mashed
- 3 large eggs
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1 TB molasses (because I use white sugar instead of brown)
- 1/2 tp salt
- 1 TB unbleached all-purpose flour
- 1 TB Trader Joe's pumpkin pie spice
- 1 can (12 oz) evaporated whole milk

Procedure:
1. Mix flour, spices, salt with calabasa. Add eggs and sugar. Mix very well by hand. Then add evaporated milk and mix some more.
2. Cover filling and allow to chill for 8 hours or overnight.
3. Remove filling from fridge. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes or so.
4. Preheat oven to 425F.
5. Pour filling into pie crust. Fill up to 1/4" from the brim of crust. Place pie on a baking sheet lined with foil to protect against spills.
6. Bake at 425F for 15 minutes. Then cover the pie crust with foil. Resume baking at 350F until the filling is set around the edges but still wobbly in the center (that is, the inner concentric circle about half the radius of the pan).
7. Remove from oven and allow to cool. Pie will firm up.

Results:
9:28am, cooking calabasa with just 1/4 cup of water; calabasa gives out water as it softens:

9:37am, filling ingredients:

9:52am, eggs beaten separately before adding to batter; this ensures thorough mixing:

10:07am, final batter to chill:

10:07am, batter height:

5:30pm, batter chilled 7 hours:

5:30pm, batter top after chilling:

6:27pm, crusts to fill:

6:30pm, all batter filled up the 10-inch crust nicely:

6:30pm, no batter for the 8-inch crust:

6:32pm, 10-inch pie placed on baking sheet to prevent spilling:

6:32pm, 10-inch pie started baking at 425F:

6:37pm, pie baked 20 minutes:

6:59pm, pie crust with shield, baking resumed at 350F:

7:13pm, pie down after 14 more minutes:

7:14pm, top of pie when just out of oven; observe its bulging top:

7:14pm, details of the bulging top at the edge:

8:37pm, this success in comparison with the next failure:

8:38pm, details of comparison between the success and the failure:

8:39pm, top and sides of the successful pie:

Next day

1:09pm, overnight:

Leftover:

Comparing this with the failure:

Observations:
1. The recipe is supposed to be for one 9-inch pie. But when the way I do it, my crust has very short edge. So this recipe fills up a 10-inch pie just right.
2. At first I thought that the filling may be too much. So I prepared a second small pie crust for it. However, the 10-in pie crust is just good enough.

Fruit custard pie

This is just the second part of my pie baking adventure which starts with a savory butter crust. The filling of this pie is a simple mixture of custard and strawberries. This is taken from KAF cookbook.

Recipe: Fruit custard pie filling (for one 9" pie)

Ingredients:
- one 9" pie crust, chilled
- 3 cups of cubed strawberries, about 1 lb, cut to 1/2" cubes
- 3 eggs
- 1/2 cup light whipping cream
- 1 cup 1% milk
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 3 TB all purpose flour

Procedure:
1. Beat eggs, milk and cream together, use low setting on electric beater.
2. Add 3 TB flour and 1/2 sugar to liquid mixture. Beat on low setting until integrated.
3. Allow liquid mixture to rest so that large bubbles disappear.
4. Preheat oven to 450F. Place rack at the bottom.
5. Place chopped strawberries evenly on chilled pie crust. Pour liquid mixture on top. Fill pie up to about 2/3. Do not overfill.
6. Bake pie on bottom rack at 425F for about 15 minutes, until crust is lightly golden and hardened.
7. Carefully take pie out, and wrap the edge with foil. Return to oven, bottom rack, and bake at 350F for about 30 minutes, or until filling is set 2 inches from the edge. It's ok of center is wobbly.
8. Allow to cool fully on rack. Chill until served.

Results:
8:22am, all ingredients (except flour) for the filling:

8:23am, half a cup of light cream:

8:23am, add to the cream 1 cup of 1% milk:

8:39am, all ingredients for making the custard:

8:42am, beating eggs, cream and milk together on low setting:

8:43am, milk mixture, with foams (to be minimized) when beaten:

8:43am, consistency of milk and egg mixture:

8:46am, sugar and starch added to mixture:

8:48am, mixture beaten for a minute, observe the thinned foam:

8:51am, mixture allowed to rest 3 minutes:

8:39am, strawberries chopped:

8:54am, fruit spread evenly in chilled crust:

8:57am, milk mixture poured in to crust:

8:57am, leftover mixture, with undissolved sugar at the bottom:

8:58am, baking started at 425F, bottom rack:

9:04am, baked 5 minutes:

9:08am, baked 9 minutes:

9:08am, edge when baked 9 minutes:

9:14am, baked 15 minutes:

9:17am, top after baking 15 minutes:

9:17am, edge after baking 15 minutes:

9:19am, crust cover prepared:

9:20am, baking resumed at 350F:

9:42am, pie baked another 22 minutes; shaken a bit to observe any wobbling:

9:42am, pie top when just out of oven:

9:42am, pie edge when just done:

9:44am, center of pie:

9:44am, fruit dried on top:

9:49am, slanted height of pie crust:

9:50am, flat top of pie filling:

9:51am, details of edge at 5 different parts of the crust:
Edge 1

Edge 2

Edge 3

Edge 4

Edge 5

10:54am, pie cooled one hour:

10:54am, crack appearing on cooled pie:

Mini pie:
8:13am, leftover dough made into pie crust:

9:01am, mini pie filled with 1 strawberry and remaining fillings, to overflowing:

9:04am, mini pie started baking:

9:11am, mini pie baked 7 minutes:

9:20am, mini pie taken out of oven after 15 minutes:

9:53am, mini pie cooled:

9:53am, mini pie center unset:

10:08am, mini pie edge cooked:

10:08am, mini pie bottom:

10:08am, uncooked crust bottom:

10:09am, thickness of expanded crust compared with filling:

10:09am, stickiness of filling to pan in areas that are not covered by crust:

Observation:
1. Do not fill the pie to the very top lest the filling rises up too high and spill over.
2. I probably over-baked this custard pie. It cracks afterwards, when cooled.
3. With the large pie, it seems that the crust that is in touch with the liquid mixture remains not fully cooked even though the exposed top crust has browned and the custard has cracked.