My friend Sylvia who owns The Green Door Gourmet has invited me to be a part of her open house this Saturday. Of course I said yes, I love to cook for an audience of folks who enjoy food enough to go somewhere and see it being made. That being said, the pressure is on. My task is to present a festive holiday dinner that can be put together quickly. I’m still deciding on most of my menu, but I know exactly what I want to do for dessert. I’m making pies in jars. Not only are they easy to make, always a plus - but also the pies are just adorable, and that puts them over the top. Well, that and the fact that they are irresistibly delicious.
I set to work experimenting with several different recipes while my husband waited for the jars to blow up in the oven. They did not and I still can’t tell if he’s disappointed or relieved. My tasters agreed that the pumpkin pie was a real winner. Admittedly it didn’t hurt that I made a maple bourbon whipped cream to go on top or that the crust is gingersnaps! The truth is that almost any pie will work in a jar. The cool factor really is cool – you can put the jars in the freezer to just hang out until you are ready to bake them. The pies can go from the freezer to a cold oven as it preheats and then amazing things begin to happen. First your house smells heavenly, then you have warm and marvelous pie to eat, and finally everyone adores you for providing a practically instant pie experience. Oh yeah, and they’re really cute!
Come out to visit Green Door Gourmet this Saturday. Enjoy demonstrations, tastings and knock out some Christmas shopping all at the same time. It doesn’t get much better!
Ingredients
Crust
1 ½ cups gingersnap crumbs (about 2 cups of cookies before being ground in the food processor)
6 Tbsp melted butter
2 Tbsp sugar
Filling
15 oz can of pumpkin
2 eggs
¾ cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
½ tsp cloves
1 tsp salt
pinch of nutmeg
12 oz can evaporated milk
6 clean ½ pint jars
Directions
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
In a large bowl mix gingersnap crumbs, butter and sugar.
Reserve ¼ cup of crust mixture for topping and divide the rest between the 6 jars.
Mix all ingredients for the filling together in a large bowl stirring with a whisk to combine.
Carefully ladle filling into jars leaving an inch unfilled at the top. (If you want to freeze the pies you can add reserved crust, put the tops on the jars and store them in the freezer. To bake from the freezer, remove tops and place in a cold oven. Preheat to 450 degrees and bake for 20 to 30 minutes until knife inserted in filling comes out clean.)
Line a baking sheet or pan with foil for easy clean-up and place jars on the sheet.
Bake for 15 minutes, remove from oven and top each pie with about a Tbsp of reserved crust.
Bake pies 10 to 15 minutes longer. A knife inserted in the filling should come out clean.
Cool pies completely.
At this point you can either eat them, or put the tops on and store in the fridge for a couple of days.
Whipped cream: whip one cup of cold cream with 4 Tbsp confectioners sugar until stiff peaks form. Mix in 1 Tbsp bourbon and 1 Tbsp maple syrup.
