Spiced Pumpkin Pie
Updated June 6, 2024
- Total Time
- 3 hours, plus chilling
- Rating
- Notes
- Read community notes
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Ingredients
Yield:8 servings
- 1¼cups/160 grams all-purpose flour
- ¼teaspoon fine sea salt
- 10tablespoons/140 grams unsalted butter, chilled and cubed
- 2 to 4tablespoons ice water, as needed
- 1cup heavy cream
- 1cinnamon stick
- 2petals from a star-anise pod (not the whole pod)
- 1whole clove
- 1tablespoon grated fresh ginger
- 1teaspoon cardamom pods
- ½teaspoon whole black peppercorns
- 1¾cups pumpkin or butternut squash purée (homemade or from a 15-ounce can)
- ¾cup/165 grams dark brown sugar
- 2large eggs
- 2large egg yolks
- 2tablespoons dark rum
- 2teaspoons ground ginger
- ½teaspoon kosher salt
- ¼teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
For the Crust
For the Filling
Ingredient Substitution Guide
Nutritional analysis per serving (8 servings)
465 calories; 28 grams fat; 17 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 8 grams monounsaturated fat; 2 grams polyunsaturated fat; 49 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams dietary fiber; 23 grams sugars; 6 grams protein; 231 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Powered byPreparation
- Step 1
Make the crust: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour and salt. Using your fingers, rub in the butter until it is the size of peas. Drizzle in water until the dough comes together when squeezed.
- Step 2
Transfer dough to a lightly floured surface. Working a palm-size chunk at a time, use the heel of your hand to smear the dough across the work surface. Continue until all the dough has been smeared, then gather it all together, flatten into a disk, and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill for at least 1 hour and up to 2 days.
- Step 3
On a lightly floured surface, roll dough into a 12-inch circle. Transfer to a 9-inch pie plate; fold the edges over and crimp. Prick crust all over with a fork and chill for at least 30 minutes.
- Step 4
Heat oven to 425 degrees. Line chilled crust with foil and pie weights, then bake for 15 minutes. Remove foil and bake until pale golden, 5 to 10 minutes longer. Transfer to a rack to cool. Lower oven temperature to 325 degrees.
- Step 5
Make the filling: In a medium pot, combine the cream, cinnamon stick, star anise petals, clove, fresh ginger, cardamom and peppercorns, and bring to a simmer. Remove from heat, cover, and let steep for 1 hour. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve into a large bowl.
- Step 6
Whisk in pumpkin, brown sugar, eggs, yolks, rum, ground ginger, salt and nutmeg. Pour into par-baked shell, transfer to a baking sheet, and bake until crust is golden and center is slightly jiggly, 50 to 60 minutes. Cool completely before serving.
Private Notes
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Cooking Notes
Julie
To save time, do step 5 right after Step 3 because the spicy cream mixture in Step 5 has to steep for 1 whole hour!
Lorraine Fina Stevenski
I make the filling in the food processor. It creates a smooth, creamy filling. Make the pie crust in the food processor, wipe it out and add all the filling ingredients. Refrigerate both overnight. The filling needs a day for the spices to get even more delicious.
Allie
Is it possible to make the crust ahead of time, parbake, and freeze? Can I also make the filling one day ahead and leave in fridge until ready to bake? or... should i just bake it the day before?
VS
Agree with other comments that the spices are lost in the creamy base. I tasted mine after steeping and decided that I needed to add about a tsp of cinnamon, and a 1/2 tsp each of nutmeg, cloves and cardamom. Result was a delicious, deep amber colored filling when baked. I would make this again with the additional spices.
Tamar M
I did not know that I could make a pumpkin pie that caused me to transcend the boundaries of space and time before tonight. This is incredible. I steeped the spices longer and added some ground cinnamon and ground cloves, plus a little vanilla. Absolutely mind-blowing.
Erin
I bought $16 worth of spices from the specialty store, but I could mostly only taste ginger/rum. The other spices were lost. I agree with others' suggestion to crush the whole spices a bit to release their flavor. I steeped them longer than required, but the other spices were still lost. Great texture from the filling, though. Not overly sweet. I would maybe scale back the rum (1TB?) and ground ginger (1tsp?) a bit.
Erin
Since the spices were lost the first go-round, I skipped the steeping, nixed the fresh ginger, and remade this recipe with: - 1 TB dark rum - 1 ½ tsp cinnamon - ½ tsp ground ginger and kosher salt - 1/4 tsp fresh ground nutmeg and fresh ground black pepper - 1/8 tsp ground cloves, ground cardamom, and ground star anise It was less of an overwhelming punch of ginger and rum this time. After sitting for 24 hours to let the spices mellow, I liked this combination of spices much better.
Kaia Dalamo
Great recipe! Yum! But unnecessarily complicado. After making the reduction of heavy cream and lots of spices, I noted how strongly it smelled like chai tea. So I looked up what ingredients to make chai tea... and voila! These ones!!! So save yourself the TIME and EXPENSE of getting all those ingredients and just brew a chai tea bag in the cream instead. Boom! Done. Also, this recipe for the crust is convoluted. There are much simpler ones.
Tony
This was awesome. Loved the spices steeped in the cream (i crushed the cardamom pods and peppercorns a bit)--Melissa is right about the fresh ginger--and the rum was just the right touch for my taste. A keeper!
ventura-cooks
My family loved this new recipe from Melissa! Ginger, spices, and rum, yum!!! For those folks who prefer less sugar you can easily reduce the sugar in this recipe to 70 grams. The rum adds plenty of sweetness.
Lou Ann
I made this because of quarantining and nothing else to do. I had made it once before and it stuck with me because it was so good. The best pumpkin pie I've ever made.
Lisa Z.
I cannot wait to try this recipe. I am thrilled that Melissa Clark is back to making her videos to accompany her recipes. I am going to try this with full fat coconut milk and dairy free 'butter' (Mykonos is amazing)-wish me luck!
JS
Do not over bake the crust in the prebake stage. I suggest only doing the baking with the weights. Or it becomes overcooked.
Paris
Good and not too difficult. Like the other comments: I crushed my spices to the point where some pieces were ground and let them steep in the cream for 3+ hours. Didn't add any rum, only used 1 tsp of vanilla extract. Added a teaspoon of ground cinnamon along with the ground ginger. Added layer of egg white wash to my pie crust so it didn't get soggy when baking. And lastly, put a foil cover on the edges to prevent burning. Super yummy!!
Katherine Hahn
Pumpkin is my favorite kind of pie, and this is my favorite recipe yet! I made it dairy free and gluten free. Since I used a pre-made crust (making sure to pre-bake it) the recipe yielded about 1/3 more filling than I could use. I used coconut cream in stead of heavy cream. At altitude, it needs to bake for 60 minutes. Tip: read the entire recipe before you begin, so that you can plan for steeping!
Adam
This recipe helped me make the best pumpkin pie I have ever eaten! I started with a long pumpkin from a local farm, which I roasted and then scooped the flesh out of. Because my pantry was poorly stocked that day, I omitted the black pepper and substituted a few whole allspices, and I used bourbon (good bourbon) instead of rum. I also didn't use the powdered ginger I had, because it was old and stale. I kept the filling and the dough in the fridge for a few days until I had time to bake.
Mariangela
Loved the complexity of spice in this recipe! Used a homegrown pumpkin for the filling which made it extra special. Definitely a sophisticated flavor profile with the steeped spices. Will make again!
DenisP
Extracting the flavors of the spices in steeped cream is pure alchemy and well worth the effort.
Denis
Should the measure of cardamom be seeds instead of pods? Teaspoon doesn't get you far.
Charissa D. Corder
The crust did_not work, we lost most of it through butter loss at the high heat. We turned to our usual crust and the day (albeit at the last minute) was saved. But it was the custard I was after and we all went oooh aah at the first bite. Spices were imbued throughout the custard which was Lucious. It was a bit "hot" on the tip of the tongue due to the ginger powder added at the end. But day after, a lovely pleasure.
anna
One of the best things I’ve baked. I upped all the spices - doubled the whole spices, infused overnight in fridge, added vanilla and pumpkin pie spice to the filling, subbed silver rum molasses for dark rum. The finale was using the two leftover egg whites for a Swiss meringue topping - omg
Eric K - NBPT
Does anyone else notice that this takes way longer to cook than stated? Closer to 90min for me than 50/60.
caro
Can you use ground spices instead of whole?
Jules
This is my go to pumpkin pie recipe, straining the spices makes the filling so smooth. A crowd favorite - the “best pumpkin pie” my three year old niece “has ever tated”
cw
I found this recipe during covid and could have sworn it was called chai spiced pumpkin pie! Agree that you should crush and steep the spices longer, and added a bit of ground cinnamon to the mixture- I used Cook’s Illustrated (oh can I say that?) fool proof pie crust recipe ‘cause it’s my favorite and egg washed the shell before baking. We absolutely loved this spice with the pumpkin! So glad I remembered it was a Melissa Clark recipe and was able to find this again!
Jenn Davis
I just dumped my pie in the compost. I think I might have over reacted. I love cardamom and ginger and I was really looking forward to tasting this, but the taste was not what I expected and I didn’t like it. It was too intense... I didn’t measure and I probably dumped too much ginger in.
Al
Adult pumpkin pie. Intense spice flavors. Will make it every year going forward.
Britt
Great, relatively easy recipe! I agree with others, a little less rum is the way to go. The blend of spices and flavors was perfect and everyone loved it at thanksgiving. The crust was difficult for me it broke a little, but tasted great! Using a metal dish instead of glass might be a good idea apparently it makes the dough less likely to slide down and shrink during blind bake. Really loved this recipe because it wasn’t the standard, boring pumpkin pie!
karen b
My family still prefers the good old LIbby’s famous recipe. However, I do like using the spiced heavy cream (with a chai tea bag) instead of evaporated milk.
Natasha
For the cream I broke the cinnamon stick into pieces, used 2 cloves, 1 tsp fresh ginger, and crushed the cardamom pods. Everything else the same. I used the pastry recipe and it’s delicious and very flaky, but I wish I would have rolled it out to 14 and had more room for a crust.
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