A few weeks ago, my CSO came back to me with a demand to stop pumpkin in all Thanksgiving development. I was left a bit gob smacked. Thanksgiving without pumpkins is like beans without acid—a world I don’t want to be a part of. But if the CSO demands it, what am I supposed to do? I set out on a mission to still bring the beloved taste of pumpkin pie to the Thanksgiving table, but this time with a bit of a soluble fiber surprise.
Growing up in my family, each person would make at least two dishes and bring them as our contributions (this was just with my family of four). I was always in charge of dessert and mashed potatoes. That being said, my perfectionist younger sibling qualities could not settle for only two desserts. I needed to make David Lebovitz’s pumpkin cheesecake, as well as a Martha Stewart cranberry tart with an almond crust. Yes, for four people.
Times change, my family no longer has our family-of-four Thanksgiving, and I often find myself traveling for the holiday—but my obsession over a Thanksgiving dessert will never go away. I must be prepared in case I’m tapped back into dessert and potatoes at a moment’s notice.
This year, I decided to try to recreate one of my favorite Thanksgiving desserts of all time: the gingersnap crust, deep-dish pumpkin pie that was at my local natural food store growing up. I loved that pie so much I had it as my birthday cake one year (my birthday is in August), and when the store closed I’ve sought out similar ones everywhere. Urth Caffé and Erewhon each have something similar, but it’s just not quite as good. I do find the Urth Caffé one better, if you are in the LA area purchasing a pie.
If you are now wondering what my field is that my CSO is concerned about pumpkins, well, let’s just say it isn’t science, strategy, nor security. The other day when I came home with a pumpkin to use as table setting in one of my recipe shoots, it was confiscated by my CSO for personal use. Let’s just say, she is a woman of greed.
Thanks to her greed, I got to recreate my favorite pie of childhood using… beans. I guess miracles do happen.
So here is my Bumpkin Pie recipe. For this I used a gingersnap crust I made. I don’t include a recipe for that here. Please use any pie crust you want. This would be great in a nut crust, normal pie crust, or of course, gingersnap.
Also this recipe contains dairy and eggs, while it is still refined sugar free, I have not tested it with substitutes and can’t assure a seamless vegan transition.
Ingredients: