Totally Crustless

Pumpkin pie suffers from the same two problems that many simple good foods suffer from – The Pimp my Ride syndrome: The belief that something good, natural and true gets better as you start loading extraneous and expensive parts onto the frame. A mascarpone brandy pumpkin pie on a candied pecan and gingersnap pastry has to be better than just a pumpkin pie, right?

And like a society that is seems to gravitate to either the high or the low, pumpkin pie can tip the scale in the other direction. The holiday pie can be a horrific example of how you can compromise flavor, taste and goodness is the name of convenience. Coolwhip, evaporated milk, vegetable shortening, pre-ground, premixed pumpkin pie spice – because you know measuring four different common spices is so much harder than finding that bottle of pumpkin spice from a year or two ago. Or the greatest monstrosity ever known to the kitchen – the store bought pre-made pie crust.

Pumpkin pie is tricky, the crust takes longer to cook than the filling, often resulting in a soggy crust, causing some cooks to misdiagnose the problem as an innate inability to make a good pie pastry. If neophyte cooks get past their ‘can’t do’ mindset about the pie crust, they often feel they don’t have the time to make a pie crust. In addition - white flour has become a bit of a dietary/cultural no–no. Even if the Fear of a Carb Planet is waning, celiac disease has really become the new lactose intolerance as far as what and why people aren’t eating these days.

Fortunately, the filling of a pumpkin pie is essentially a big custard, similar to flan or pot de crème - crust isn’t necessary to enjoy the dessert(ed) pumpkin. The traditional pie can be made sans pastry, baked in individual ramekins instead. Prepared 24 to 72 hours ahead of time, pumpkin flan allows the cook to enjoy Thanksgiving Day instead of stressing out over one more thing to do in a limited time frame.

This is basically the recipe on the back of the pumpkin can with a few adjustments: Okay, one adjustment - cream takes the place of evaporated milk, condensed milk and milk milk. Poach-baking; cooking in a water bath is a method of cooking that seems inelegant - involving hot water, a roasting pan and an oven. Eggs cook/scramble at a very low temperature, a water bath, even in a 350+ oven, will not get hotter than 212 degrees, allowing the custard to cook gently, slowly.

Pumpkin Flan

Preheat oven to 350º ƒ. Fill a roasting pan - 9 x 13 like the type you'd bake brownies in - fill half full of hot tap water place on middle rack of the oven. Bring 4 cups water to boil in tea kettle or microwave, set aside.

1 15 oz can pumpkin puree
1 cup heavy cream
¾ cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon*
½ t. ginger* ½ t. nutmeg*
1 clove ground or a pinch of ground cloves*
pinch of salt

Warm above ingredients together over low heat, while constantly stirring. This pre-heating, reduces cooking time and pumpkin seems to come alive – like blooming spices for a curry or decanting wine, gently warming really seems to build the taste.

*These are guidelines for spices, not all spices are the same in their freshness and potency, flavor to taste. If ½ teaspoon of nutmeg is good, a full teaspoon isn’t twice as good.

Whip together:
½ cup heavy cream
3 large eggs

When the pumpkin spice mixture is warm remove from heat and add cream and eggs. Thoroughly mix together. Thoroughly. Pour pumpkin custard into individual ramekins. This recipe should fill 8 - 4oz ramekinsª. Place ramekins in the water filled roasting pan residing is in the oven. Add water from tea kettle so that water comes up about 2/3 -3/4 of the side of the roasting pan. Set timer for 25 minutes.

The pumpkin flan is done when the outside of the ramekin is done and the center most spot, about the size of a nickel is still jiggley, jello jiggley. Remove baking dish from oven, take ramekins out of the water and place on a cooling rack – like you'd do with cookies. After they are room temperature, wrap and refrigerate. These are really good solo, with a ginger cookie or whip cream.

ª Ramekins can be 4, 6 or 8 oz. They can be short with a lot of surface area or more cylindrical – all this means - cooking times will vary. 45 minutes to an hour isn’t outside the realm of possibility.