Spiced Sweet Potato Pie with Gingersnap Pecan Crust
Personally, my favorite way to eat sweet potatoes is in pie form. This pie provides a jolt of heat in the creamy, sweet filling, making it a pie worthy of royalty. The pie crust is special too; it adds a ton of gingersnap and pecan flavor. So much better than plain old pie crust.
Makes about 12 servings
FOR PIE CRUST
1-1/2 cups coarse Hot Gingersnap cookie crumbs (from approximately 20 cookies) (recipe follows)
1/2 cup ground roasted or raw pecans
5 tablespoons butter, melted
FOR PIE FILLING
3 cups mashed, roasted sweet potato
3 eggs
2 tablespoons Frank’s® RedHot® Original Cayenne Pepper Sauce
3 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
10 tablespoons evaporated milk
1/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1 Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2 To make the pie crust, whisk together the cookie crumbs and pecans in a medium bowl. Drizzle with melted butter. Stir with a fork until it looks like damp sand. Press into the bottom and sides of a pie tin in an even layer. Bake 10 minutes. Remove to a wire rack to cool.
3 To make the filling, place all the ingredients in a large bowl. Mix together, using an electric mixer, until all the ingredients are well incorporated and the mixture is fairly smooth.
4 Pour into the prepared pie crust. Bake for 60 minutes or until the pie is set and no longer shiny.
5 Cool completely on a wire rack. Serve when cool.
• Use a food processor or powerful mixer to grind the cookies into crumbs. Simply pulse until the desired texture is reached and no large chunks remain.
• Wash the potatoes, pierce each potato in 1 or 2 places with the tip of a knife, and then roast the potatoes for 1 hour at 400°F or until soft. Scoop the flesh out and discard the skin. Allow the potatoes to cool completely, then mash. This can be done the night before you’d like to make the pie.
• Use the flat bottom of a measuring cup to smooth and flatten the crumbs into the bottom and sides of the pie tin.