It's Pie Season
a prize winning matcha pie recipe and some last minute friendsgiving prep
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Last month I may have scratched a baking itch I did not know I had by entering a local pie competition. I decided to make a matcha cream pie with black sesame biscoff crust and anise meringue. Lo and behold the little pie won first place. After much anticipation, here I am in your inbox, finally sharing the highly requested recipe with you (or at least sharing the recipes I adapted).
It’s also the thanksgiving eve, so I couldn’t be more excited to share it with you in case you need some last minute culinary inspiration.
@matchaandmoi’s Matcha Cream Pie
Bakes one scrumptious 9 inch pie.
Ingredients
Biscoff cookie crust
Some biscoff pie crust recipes also add in brown sugar to help the crust keep its structure, but I found that foregoing it was perfectly ok! The cookies are already quite sweet anyways.
3 8oz packs of Biscoff cookies
1.5 sticks of unsalted butter, melted
Black sesame paste (to spread on the parbaked cookie crust):
½ cup of black sesame seeds
2 tbs of olive oil (or any neutral oil like grapeseed or avocado)
Matcha cream filling (used the NYT recipe, but with more matcha)
2/3 cup granulated sugar
1.5 tbs flour
¼ tsp salt
2 tbs ceremonial matcha powder
1 stick unsalted butter, melted
3 eggs, plus 1 egg yolk
2 cups heavy cream
½ tsp vanilla paste or extract
Anise meringue (Used this basic Italian meringue recipe, and folded in 1 tsp of anise extract after meringue was formed)
1 cup sugar
½ cup water
4 large egg whites
½ tsp cream of tartar or lemon juice
1 tsp anise extract
Steps
The crust
Heat oven to 325 degrees.
In a food processor (or if you have the resolve to do it by hand, in a bag + heavy object), finely crush the 3 packs of biscoff cookies until the largest pieces remaining are pumpkin seed sized.
Pour into a large bowl and work in the melted butter to form clumps that start to hold together.
Transfer the clumpy crumbs into your pie dish, and press to form an ideally even crust.
Bake in the oven for 20 minutes and let cool.
The sesame paste (to make while your crust is parbaking)
To spice up our rather predictable Biscoff cookie crust, we’re going to make a creamy, slightly savory black sesame paste to spread on the bottom of your parbaked crust once it’s cooled.
Again, in a food processor or trusty blender, finely pulse the black sesame seeds while slowly adding in the olive oil so that a smooth paste is formed.
Spread an even layer onto the bottom of the cooled pie crust (I chose not to coat the edges for fear of it turning ugly, but feel free to do that as well!).
The cream filling (to make while your crust is parbaking)
Using a hand held or stand mixer, whisk together sugar, flour, salt, and matcha.
Beat in butter and the eggs one at a time.
Beat for a couple more minutes, then stir in the cream and vanilla. Strain into your cooled pie shell (which should already have the black sesame paste layer).
The final stretch
Bake the pie for 50 minutes until the edges are set (the center will not be completely set).
Allow to cool for ~30minutes.
Anise meringue (to make while the pie is cooling)
Used this basic Italian meringue recipe, and folded in 1 tsp of anise extract after meringue was formed
Pipe the meringue into little dollops or however your heart desires onto the slightly cooled pie.
Either use a flame torch or broil for ~30sec to scorch the meringue tips.
Finally let the pie cool for another hour or two before serving.
This is a pie that I will be making time and time again…it surely stands out from the predictable pumpkin and apple pies, yet still feels worthy of tradition in its own way.
If you need some more meal inspo, my friends put together a cute Friendsgiving Notion for this year (or you can make a notes app version like the one I made for last year):
Maybe this is a perfectly sappy time to mention, I’m so grateful for the community we have going on here. If you ever have any fun matcha ideas you’d like to experiment with, feel free to reach out!
Cheers,
Kelly