Episode 25 – Pumpkin Mousse Pie

Episode 25
November 19, 2010
Pumpkin Mousse Pie

First of all, hurray 25 episodes!  That’s quite a landmark, and what a great recipe to fall on my 25th episode.  I’m not going to lie – this is my absolute favorite recipe.  Okay this might sound a little egotistic but this is the greatest pie you will ever eat.  I am not kidding.  This pie has super powers.  Seriously!  Whenever I bring this pie to somebody for the first time they gobble it down.  They put away the knife and pie server and put on their eating bib and grab a spoon.  This is also the recipe that everybody always asks me for and I’m so happy to be sharing it with all of you – just in time for the holidays no less!

If you’re tired of the same ol’ pumpkin pie recipe then you have to try this no bake cream pie recipe.  The story behind this recipe is when I was in high school I was taking a filler elective called Food & Nutrition.  Don’t get excited it was nothing more than glorified home ec, but the teacher was really nice and she taught me a lot of the basics that got me so interested in the baking & pastry industry.  Well, the whole food industry really.  Anyway, she knew I was looking for a different kind of pumpkin pie recipe at the time and she found an interesting pumpkin mousse recipe in her Reader’s Digest and she gave it to me.  I was really interested and so I typed it up and put it in my recipe catalog but it just fell to the back burner and I never actually made it.

Fast forward to my sophomore year in college and once again I was getting the itch for a new pie recipe.  I stumbled upon my old recipes and I immediately knew that’s what I wanted to do.  I took the pumpkin mousse recipe and altered it – although I can’t remember how much I changed it – and made it.  PURE LOVE.  I’ve refined it to what it is today and ever since then this pumpkin mousse pie has been a holiday treat for anybody I can bring it to.

The recipe itself is pretty great because it’s so simple.  The ingredients are readily available and there’s very little work to do.  You can even cut the prep time down if you buy pre-made crusts at the store.  There are a few things you need to be aware of when you make the recipe:

1.  The smallest amount makes 1 1/2 pies.  Weird, I know.  That’s because I hate using half a can of ingredients so I refused to go less than 1 can of pumpkin puree and 1 can of sweetened condensed milk.  That’s okay though because if there is extra mousse (which can happen even in the 3 pie batch) you can always make individual glass servings.

2.  When you’re folding make sure to get the bottom of the bowl.  This seems to always happen to me but the very bottom of the pumpkin mousse seems to avoid getting mixed in with the whipped cream.  This isn’t a huge disaster but it’s a little annoying.  If it doesn’t get mixed in at the bottom just pour a little bit of this leftover mix into each pie shell and stir it in.  It won’t affect the texture or flavor, but it can affect the color.

3.  When you’re making the whipped cream topping you might want to use a little more heavy cream than what I put in the recipe.  That depends on what your intention for the decoration is.  I used 1# 5 ounces of heavy cream to make my decoration but remember my decoration was very small and ornate.  If you intend to glob it on, like I did for the peanut butter pie recipe, you may need more.  I already added extra to the recipe you can download but just be aware that the recipe makes enough for piping.  Luckily, whipped cream is easy to make (you don’t even need to clean your bowl first if all you did was whip cream and you’re going to whip cream again) so it’s not a huge deal if you need more.  It’s just that I don’t want you to run out of whipped cream and have used the last pint of heavy cream in your fridge.

Whipped cream, by the way, is extremely perishable.  Many bake shops refuse to save any leftover whipped cream because it’s just not the same the next day.  However, if they have a huge amount leftover they will try to save it.  Here’s what you can do if you ever find yourself in that situation.  Whipped cream the next day is very firm and pipes horribly.  However, you can “refresh” it by whipping it again with unwhipped heavy cream.  Don’t just try to rewhip it.  Unlike buttercream which can handle this kind of torture, whipped cream is much more sensitive.  If you just rewhip the whipped cream without any extra heavy cream you’ll just make butter.  I’d say that you need a 1:1 ratio (8 ounces of whipped cream needs 8 ounces of heavy cream) if you want to refresh your cream, but you can probably get away with a little less heavy cream.

Anyway, here is the recipe for Pumpkin Mousse Pie (the nilla wafer crust recipe is included but is also available for separate download here).  The nilla wafer crust recipe, by the way, works with any cookie crumbs.  Enjoy the videos below and have a happy Thanksgiving!  Thanks for watching!