Greetings Gastronauts! This is Keef Cooks,
I'm Keef and today, well, we've got
Halloween coming up so I'm going to do a
pumpkin pie.
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And I've had a request to do
this from Mrs. Keef Cooks who's, well,
like me, she's never had a proper pumpkin
pie. So yeah, it's about time we found out
what all the fuss is about.
And also shoutouts to my three new
Patreon fans [ CHEERING ] -
I think. Anyway, welcome guys,
thank you - I appreciate it.
Now when I was a kid, Halloween was
almost nothing - it was just, y'know, a
thing that happened, but there was no big
deal about it because we were actually
more excited about the prospect of
playing with fireworks on the 5th of November.
[ LAUGHS ]
However, times have changed and
Halloween is a massive thing now. And
you've got to have pumpkins. So I've got pumpkins.
Pumpkin pie, let's do it!
So at this time of year, the shops are
full of these things - pumpkins for making
jack-o'-lanterns out of.
And I thought, well I might do that,
but also I can use the insides to make
pumpkin pie and not waste it.
But apparently these are rubbish for eating -
the insides are stringy and watery and just
bleurgh, but the outsides look wonderful.
So what you need is one of these - which
looks quite a lot less wonderful but is
described as a culinary pumpkin. So
I shall make pumpkin pie with this and
I'll make a jack-o-lantern with that.
So it seems that making your own pumpkin
puree isn't a thing that really happens
a lot in America because you get it in
cans made by Libby's. But yeah, we don't
have that because really in the UK
pumpkin pie - meh. We just don't get it
really. Anyway, so I've got to make my
own puree and what you need to do is
roast this first. So you want your oven
on 180 degrees Celsius if it's a fan oven
or 200 Celsius if it isn't.
OK so let's just...
get the label off...
and cut this in half.
Oh and the other thing - alongside
these in the supermarket they also
had a lot of butternut squash which
you can use instead of these if you want.
So then your pumpkin pie contains no
pumpkin and isn't a pie anyway really.
Oh yeah, oh that is so appealing. So we need
to scoop these fibres and seeds out -
pumpkin seeds you can eat those can't
you? Maybe I'll save them. Oh that was a
bit of a an effort. So put them skin side
up in a roasting tin - couple of tablespoons
of water, and put that in the oven for
about 30 minutes until the flesh is
tender. Right there's my roasted pumpkin
- it doesn't seem to be a huge amount
there but I'll just let that cool
down and then, sort of peel it and scoop out
the actual flesh. OK now it's cool
enough to handle so we just scrape the
flesh off the skin, which is not too
difficult. OK, actually, there's quite a
lot more than I expected there so we'll
pop it in the jug for the stick blender
and puree it.
[ BLENDER NOISE ]
[ LAUGHS ]
Right, now you need to drain it - it doesn't
actually seem that wet but all the recipes
I've looked at are very insistant that
you have to get as much moisture out as
you can, otherwise you'll end up with a
very soggy pumpkin pie and we don't want that.
So I've got a bit of muslin cloth -
cheesecloth - in a colander and I'll just
tie that up, hang it up over a bowl - well
until it stops dripping I suppose.
Now we're going to need a pie crust, and for
that you'll need pastry - or buy a
ready-made pie crust, or ready made pastry.
I don't do those things because I like
things to be difficult, so I'm making my
own pastry - this is a sweet shortcrust.
So I've got 150 grams of plain
all-purpose flour, 50 grams of caster
sugar - possibly powdered sugar - and 100
grams of cold butter straight from the
fridge. Also a pinch of salt and two eggs.
So you want to grate your butter. This is
starting to warm up already - doesn't
matter too much.
Sift your flour and sugar together - use a
bigger bowl if you don't want to get it
everywhere. And add your pinch of salt
just stir that together,
pop the grated butter in, and now you
want to rub the butter into the flour
and sugar mix - just use your fingertips -
just kind of rub it in until you get a
mixture that looks like breadcrumbs. Now
you want to break your eggs into a bowl
and smash them up a bit and pop them in.
And then just stir it together. Tip it
out onto worktop 'cos it'll need a
little bit of kneading [ LAUGHS ]
not needing like bread just, y'know,
just to bring it together properly. And
then wrap that in plastic film and stick
it in the fridge for about, I don't know
half an hour to rest. OK, pastry's chilled
and we need to blind bake it which means,
y'know to partially bake it so that
the wet, or y'know, the moist
filling doesn't give you a soggy bottom -
uh-oh innuendo alert! So I'm going to use
this little tin - I'm using it because
it's nice and deep and it's 18
centimeters, 7 inches and I've buttered
the inside because I'm like that. So you
just want to roll your pastry out into a
disc that's less than a quarter of an
inch about 2 or 3 millimeters thick. Just
roll it over your rolling pin and then
drape it over your baking tin gently,
make sure it's in all the corners -
they're not really corners but y'know what
I mean. And then trim off the excess and
just press it - press it together to make
it neat. And you need to just stab the
bottom with a fork because that will
stop it puffing up. Then line it with
some crumpled up greaseproof paper -
parchment paper - and fill that with the
weighing-down medium of your choice -
baking beans, or dried beans or rice. I
always use rice because it's finer and
y'know, you can it can get into the
sharp bits better. So for the first bit
of the blind bake that goes in the oven
for 10 minutes.
So after 10 minutes get the crust out of
the oven and remove the baking thing and
pop that back in for another 10 minutes.
OK there's the blind baked case and
that needs to cool down a little bit
until you can get it out of the tin and
then put it on a wire rack and let it
cool down completely.
Now we need to make up the filling, I've got my
pumpkin puree - there's about 250 grams there.
I've also got some bonus pumpkin juice - every
underage wizards second favourite drink,
after butterbeer. And I've got a hundred
grams of granulated sugar, 65 grams of
light brown Demerara sugar and two eggs.
And also 1/2 teaspoons of ground
cinnamon, a teaspoon of ground ginger, and
a half teaspoon of ground cloves. So we
need the blender - the big one. And I
forgot to mention 200 mils of evaporated
milk. So we just pop everything in there -
apart from the pumpkin juice, I'm not
touching that!
[ LAUGHS ]
Ploosh!
[ MUSIC ]
Don't forget to put the lid on.
OK so we'll smoothie it.
[ MUSIC and BLENDER NOISE ]
And when your pastry case is cool
enough, we can assemble it and bake it.
Right, we're ready to bake the pumpkin
pie. So I've got the oven preheating to 160
degrees Celsius because it's a fan oven, or
180 if it isn't. Now here's my cooled
pumpkin pie filling and here's my blind
baked crust. Continuity freaks will
notice it isn't the same crust that I
made earlier. It's another one because
the first one just kind of fell apart
when I tried to trim off the edge -
because this pastry is so short you
can't easily or neatly cut it, so I made
another one. There you go. Right, just...
pop the filling in the, in the case. Wooo.
And that needs to bake for 30 to 40
minutes, so I'll check it after 30 and
see what's happening.
And that's still a bit runnier in the
middle or, y'know, wobblier then I would
like so I'll give it another five or ten minutes.
That looks great.
That's just what we want - there we go -
that's looking pretty fab. So I'll let
that cool down for a little bit then I'll
pop it in the fridge for a couple of
hours to set completely. And then we can
try pumpkin pie!
So I'm just about to
taste test the pumpkin pie and I'm just
going to make up some Chantilly cream. So
you want some double cream - heavy cream -
that's about 150 ml. And you want some
sugar - caster sugar -powdered sugar - about
50 grams and some vanilla essence - that much.
Now you just whip it. Whip it good.
[ WHIPPING NOISES ]
And after a few minutes it'll go thick like that.
That's it, Chantilly cream. Fantastic!
OK pumpkin pie taste test. I could
mention at this point that I've never
had pumpkin pie before and I'm not a big
fan of squash-type things, so I'm being
very brave and mm-hmm...
That's actually really nice!
Mmm I think it's the spices that really make
it happen because I don't know what
pumpkin tastes like but well it tastes
like cinnamon and cloves and the other
thing. Pumpkin pie. Fantastic!
And that's that, I hope you enjoyed it.
Now please do the usual - likes, shares,
comments, subscriptions, donations,
patronage - all that good stuff. Or just
some of it. Thank you for watching
and see you next time
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