I’ve always used butter for my crusts. I’ve hated crisco for decades. It never felt right to me that chemically adding a hydrogen atom to fat was a good thing for humans.
We haven’t eaten supermarket cakes in a long time-that nasty shortening sticks to the top of my mouth and it’s SO gross. :-&
I really like the taste of pecans, so I tend not to muddy the waters flavor-wise with other stuff in the pie like chocolate or espresso (and I love both of those flavors). Let the pecans shine! I’m ok with a little bit of rum or bourbon, but really no more than I’d add vanilla (which in my house comes in bourbon). I like my booze in a glass, not on a plate
Can I just say that I LOVE that on CC we have managed to get 6 pages of posts over “pecan pie” and are still going?! Why I love this community.
I caught some of the Holiday Great American Bake Off (or whatever that show is called) last night - did anyone see it? One of their tasks was to bake a nut pie - can’t remember if it was specifically pecan? - BUT one contestant did a combo pecan/hazelnut pie - the judges loved it!
Vodka is 40% alcohol, so if you dilute your moonshine appropriately and it does not have any volatile flavors that co-distilled with the booze to affect the pie crust taste, it will work.
I always wondered back in the days when I was a TA why my undergrads liked the labs that involved distillation.
Another Texas girl, here. You cannot go wrong with the recipe on the back of the KARO syrup bottle. I add more pecans but that’s the only change you’d want. Don’t mess with lliquor or chocolate. It’s not a pecan pie with that stuff in it! Might be good but it ain’t a pecan pie! And, adding walnuts to a pecan pie? With all due respect to Martha Stewart, that’s sacrilege!
Remember…puh-CON…is the correct pronunciation. It’s the state tree of Texas, in case you didn’t know!
Don’t sweat the small stuff! If you’re not a pie crust pro, go with Pillsbury refrigerated crust–already rolled out and all. You just put it in your plate, add filling and crimp the edges any way you wish!
If your son’s girlfriend loves pecan pie, then make pecan pie. Your desire to tweak the recipe because you don’t really like pecan pie are immaterial. Son’s girlfriend is going to want the recipe on the back of the KARO bottle. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Don’t jeopardize the relationship with a possible future family member with a fancy adaptation of pecan pie. You don’t have to eat it if it’s too sweet for you.
Again, I’m speaking as a true pecan pie lover. It’s probably my favorite pie. If someone wanted to bake a pie for me and added bourbon or chocolate or crushed the pecans, etc., it would not be the same, and not worth eating.
There’s a difference between a classic done well and the lowest common denominator. Believe me, this person has a sophisticated palate.
The idea that our relationship would be harmed by my taking a few steps to make a better pie than the Karo syrup version thrown into a storebought crust is pretty ridiculous. I mean, MOST of the supposedly classic recipes out there use a lot more butter, just for starters.
Seriously? You would reject some variation? So, if a person used one of the recipe with brown sugar and more butter, instead of what’s on the Karo bottle, you would reject it as “not worth eating” and resent them for it? Somehow I doubt it.
My D’s love my pumpkin pies. They have tried their grandmother’s and in laws but they didn’t care for them. Now they just politely say they aren’t hungry and wait until they get home to get pie. They don’t resent them for making something different but they definitely don’t think it is worth eating something they dislike. Even I won’t eat my MIL’s!
I think if a purist actually tasted a well-made variation, they may come around.
The alcohol enhances the flavor of the pecan. Some flavors are only soluble in alcohol. The trick is to use just enough to make it better without overpowering the pecans with the flavor of the alcohol.
Unless you only eat your own pecan pie, odds are that some had alcohol in them and you never even knew.
But if the idea is to please the girlfriend by offering her something she is nostalgic for, I don’t see why you wouldn’t ask her for her family’s recipe, and make it that way even if it doesn’t meet your standards.
I really do not think this is some big family tradition for her. Her father is French. He and her mother met in Paris, where both were working in the fashion industry, and lived there until the GF was 8. The GF went to university in Canada. They have family in France that they visit. French was her first language. She didn’t say she is nostalgic for pecan pie. She just said, when I asked if they had an particular preference and started listing possibilities, that she liked it.
Honestly, I think people are reading a lot more into this than is there! We’re not talking some dyed-in-the-wool Southern girl with a hankering for home. She doesn’t want to live in Florida, which is why she is where she is.
The mistake isn’t adapting, especially when someone like Consolation likes cooking. The mistake would be insisting the new version is the only one anyone with good taste would like, that it’s the one and only best, and knocking the traditional the girl’s family likes/makes.
I’m betting Consolation would never do that. So all will be well.
Consolation…the pumpkin pies differ because of spices used and different pie crusts. I have a good recipe for Pumpkin cheesecake with swirled chocolate through it that I love but I get push back from my family when I talk about having that instead of pumpkin pie. We may also be one of the only families that doesn’t add whipped cream on our pie. Guess we are purists!
@consolation My french mother who ended up in Tennessee with my dad always made pecan pie from a recipe that she got from a southern lady in TN. My mom in general doesn’t like things that are overly sweet but she liked this. It’s always been my favorite thanksgiving pie and it was the first pie that my daughter, who would not eat any pie for years, liked. It is a version made with a mix of brown sugar, white sugar, eggs and butter, so good!
Now, me, I would never think of making something with chocolate for a Thanksgiving dessert.
The only controversial element I intend to put in this pecan pie is a couple of TBS of bourbon, unless I drink it all first! B-)
@NorthMinnesota, we never have whipped cream on pie either, but I gather that it is de rigeur for pecan pie? (This should be good for another 6 pages, LOL, one of the many reasons I love CC.)
