AMAZING Buttermilk Pie (piecrust too!)

This week we made Buttermilk Pie (a true Southern dessert) for our Recipe of the Week!!!

Here's a little fact: Buttermilk pie is a traditional custard-like pie of the southern US, and is especially well known in Texas. It is similar to, and sometimes confused with, chess pie, but it does not include cornmeal.

Anywho... Y'all are getting a two-for-one recipe because the pie crust is also homemade and soooooooo good; I promise! Let's get started!

Baker's Secret Pie Crust (courtesy of Carolealana) and Buttermilk Pie filling

Ingredients for the crust:

4 tbsp unsalted butter
5 tbsp shortening (preferably butter flavored)

3/4 cup cake flour*

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp white sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/8 tsp baking powder

1 egg yolk
2 tsp distilled white vinegar
3 cubes of ice
1/2 cup cold water

*I don't have cake flour and it's slightly superfluous, so if you want to use all-purpose flour instead this is the conversion I found:

1 cup cake flour = 1 cup all-purpose flour minus 1 tbsp


Ingredients for the filling:

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 tbsp flour
3 eggs
1 pinch salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup buttermilk

We'll make the pie crust first and then when it's moved to the freezer near the end, we'll start in on the filling... This whole process takes approximately 2-3 hours, 40 minutes of that the pie crust is "relaxing" in the fridge and about an hour of baking time, so there is some down time in it...

Ok, first we are going to take the butter and shortening and cut it into pieces on a plate. This will make it easier later on. The shortening doesn't really have to be that small because it will stay fairly soft, but the butter should be sliced into about 1/2 tbsp size portions.

Take the plate and stick it in the freezer for about 20 minutes. While that sets in the freezer, put the flour(s), sugar, salt and baking powder (not soda!!!) into the food processor. Pulse it for a few seconds until mixed.

Then, add half of the cold butter and half of the cold shortening to the dry ingredients in the food processor and pulse on/off for one minute. You'll need to scrape down the sides 2-3 times. Add the remainder of the butter and shortening and cut in very briefly with the food processor. There need to be pea-sized chunks so try not to over process it.

In a small bowl, add the egg yolk, vinegar, ice cubes and water together. Chill for five minutes. Meanwhile, move the mixture from the food processor to a mixing bowl. After the egg wash has chilled, sprinkle about 4-5 tbsp of it onto the butter/flour mixture. Do this a couple tablespoons at a time to prevent the dough from becoming overly wet. Also, mix the dough gently, so as not to over-mix. I used a plastic knife and just kept cutting through the dough until it was "mixed." Move the dough to a plastic bag and let it set in the refrigerator for five minutes. You can freeze it at this stage, but I can't tell you if the dough will be the same since I haven't done this...

Pull it out of the refrigerator and place it between two large pieces of plastic wrap. This will make for easier cleanup and transfer of the dough to the pie pan. Roll out the dough to a good sized circle 10-11 inches in diameter. Then peel of the top piece of plastic wrap, set the pie pan face down on the dough, and flip everything. You should be able to gently remove the other piece of plastic wrap from the "new" topside of the dough.

Let the piecrust sit in the refrigerator for 40 minutes to relax the gluten and reduce shrinkage. Then, move it to the freezer for the an additional 20 minutes. This is when we make the filling...


Pre-heat the oven to 400*F. Then cream the sugar and butter together until light. Beat in the eggs and vanilla. Add a decent pinch of salt, the buttermilk and the 3 tablespoons of flour...(I accidently added to much flour the first time I made this pie and ended up with paste; I had to restart the filling all over) ... Beat the batter until as smooth as possible. Pour the filling into your cold piecrust and place it in the oven... I used a 9" cake pan since I didn't have a pie pan and it came out the same...

After 10 minutes, reduce heat to 350*F and bake for an additional 50 minutes. The top will start to turn a golden brown around the 40 minute mark. You don't want it to overly brown on top, so once it gets to a good color, place a piece of tin foil over the top of your pie and continue to bake it. It's done when you can insert a knife into the pie and it comes out clean or you can give it a little giggle. It won't have the rolling batter effect if it's done; instead, it will remain pretty solid in a custard-y like way...

Let it cool and then you can enjoy it! I eat it once it's cooled all the way, but some people like it warmed---just personal preference I guess :) Have fun baking!!!




UPDATE: Well, the house thing kinda fell out of the sky and crashed at our feet... Long story short, our mortgage lender sent us a pre-approval that apparently he couldn't back up even though he reassured us for over a month that we were pre-approved and our chances were very high of having the loan go through. Then, five minutes before we sign the contract for the new house, our lender calls us up and tells us everything is a no-go. Not only could he not approve us for the amount that we had been pre- approved for, he could only approve us for a load that was $30K less than that amount!!! He said there had been a mistake in the numbers and he miscalculated, but "we should be happy that we found out prior to signing the contract." I was so angry! Since we own everything, we don't have credit AND you can pay all of your bills on time, and they will never send anything to the credit bureaus; miss one and they are all over reporting you---which is completely unfair...so we've never been late either... I understand that it might be difficult for us to get the mortgage we need, but don't tell me that you can do it, and then tell us something drastically different last minute. The house we are living in currently was supposed to be sold 5 days after the day we were supposed to sign the contract on our new house, and they were supposed to sell there house the week after they purchase our home... So this one mistake has caused problems for FOUR FAMILIES and lost us two contracts... Now we are just waiting for some time to elapse since our credit history is just too recent for us to have any scores.... which will most likely be in July. We are praying against all odds that the home is still there, waiting for us!

The silver lining is: Jace will be starting his credit history as early as possible. We will all go to the bank and get a loan with him and then pay it back, until he can get a credit card---which he will learn to monitor... until hopefully, he has better credit then we do! So I might as well mention it here: Yes, Mom, you can say "I told you soooo!"

On to a brighter note, Jace has learned to sign "more" and he does it all. the. time. He loves using it and being able to tell use he wants more of this or that. Besides more, he understands the signs for milk, stars (the baby cereal snacks), eat, pacifier (modified since it's so similiar to eat) and sleep. We are starting to work on bath, diaper, colors and different foods, but we'll see what he picks up next. It's nice that he can tell us what he wants instead of just crying...


Can't wait for the next Recipe of the Week!