Episode 63
August 14, 2011
Strawberry Chiffon Pie
When I was growing up strawberry was one of my favorite flavors. Often times, instead of getting chocolate ice cream I would ask for strawberry ice cream. As an adult I find that I seem to crave chocolate much more than I used to which means strawberry has taken second place. Despite how much I love chocolate, I still have my cravings for strawberry. This pie is a great summer treat and is much easier to make than one would think – plus it has the taste and texture of a professional bake shop fruit mousse pie.
For this recipe I recommend using frozen strawberries. For one, frozen strawberries tend 
to be a little more ripe and flavorful than fresh – though this is not the case when strawberries are in season. Frozen strawberries are usually a little cheaper than fresh strawberries and because we’ll be boiling down most of the strawberries for the pie it would be a shame to waste all that money on fresh strawberries. Of course, feel free to use fresh strawberries if you prefer. The recipe is slightly different for fresh strawberries so be sure to check the recipe.
This recipe uses a pre-baked pie shell so be sure to check the basic pie dough post for more information on how to make and roll out pie dough. I’ll also include the video below so you can just watch it here. Over the past year or so, I keep changing how I pre-bake a pie shell but I think I’m pretty happy with the technique I use in the video. The technique involves using a weighed down pie tin to keep the pie shell from rising. Remember that if you want to have fluted edges you can’t use that technique. You will have to use a coffee filter filled with baking beans. Baking beans is a generic term that has come to mean a variety of things used to weigh the pie shell down during baking. Dry beans, dry rice, and ceramic balls designed for baking (found in baking supply stores) are all examples of baking beans. Many bake shops I worked in used dry beans to weigh down pie shells, though I can’t particularly remember which kind, but as for dry rice I’m not sure how well it will work. Whichever you use keep in mind that you probably won’t be able to use them for anything else – though we often reused baking beans several times at the bake shops before throwing them out.
This episode I also demonstrate how to make chocolate butterflies. Chocolate butterflies 
are some of my favorite decorations for pies, cakes, and desserts. They are actually really easy to make – especially if you use coating chocolate. Instead of explaining the whole process here I’ll direct you to the page that I made for explaining the technique for making chocolate butterflies.
As for finishing the pie feel free to use your imagination. This pie is very much a blank canvas and you can use all kinds of toppings to finish it including: Browned meringue, whipped cream, buttercream, chocolate drizzle, toasted nuts and coconut, and fresh fruit. In fact, the filling itself is extremely versatile. If you make it a little thicker with more gelatin it might work as a cake filling. You can also serve the filling in fancy glasses like the ones I used in the Peach Bellini, Lemon Drop, and Monkey’s Lunch episodes.
Here’s the recipe for the Strawberry Chiffon pie and here’s the pie dough recipe. Enjoy the videos below! Thank you for watching!
Basic Pie Dough videos:
