I am an avid Laura Ingalls Wilder reader and HUGE fan. I have a tendency to re-read her books many times. The other day, I was re-reading Farmer Boy, for the umpteenth time and (I am guess because of this blog) I started to pay more attention to the foods that were mentioned in the book. Farmer Boy, is about a little boy named Almonzo Wilder, who grew up to marry Laura Ingalls. The book tells about how life was, when he was a boy, the farm work, the life lessons and the enormous amount of food, it takes to grow a young boy. Every mealtime that was described in the book, told of pies, cakes, roasts, sauces and then dessert. I started looking up some of the recipes and one of them was a Custard Pie.
For this pie, you will need an uncooked crust (My Pie Crust Recipe) and your favorite custard recipe. This is one of my custard recipes, I decided to try for this pie. You can use this recipe or My Baked Custard Recipe.
Custard:
3 eggs, beaten + 1 yolk (reserve white)
3/4 cup white sugar
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups of scalded milk (IMPORTANT)
1/4 teaspoon of ground nutmeg
1 egg white
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 F
- Pierce uncooked pie crust all over with a fork.
- Place a greased sheet of aluminum foil over the inside of an uncooked pie crust and over aluminum, place pie weights (or beans)
- Bake pie crust for 20 minutes
- Mix together eggs, yolk, sugar, salt, vanilla
- Slowly, incorporate scalded milk to egg mixture (too fast and you will cook the egg)
- Brush the inside bottom and sides of pastry crust with egg white.
- Pour custard into pie crust and sprinkle with nutmeg
- Bake for 30-35 minutes or until center comes out clean
- Cool completely before serving
My crust cooked a little too long (I corrected the precook time in the directions), so please don’t mind the picture.