Easy, frozen, Peanut Butter Pie - Gourmet 1995

 

 

My grandson took this picture with my Galaxy Tablet.  Didn't he do a phenomenal job?  Kids today are just so tech savy....

I was looking for a peanut butter pie for a recent family get together.  And this one from Gourmet jumped out at me.

It doesn't have the heavy cream cheese base that a lot of the recipes I found do.  It's light, airy and delicious too.  It's also so easy to make and freeze ahead, just pull it out of your freezer 1/2 hour before you serve it.

There were a few reviews of this dessert, all excellent by the way.  And one gal said she used oreo cookies (about 3 sleeves), instead of the chocolate graham crackers.  That's what I used.  I also spread the cookie crumb mixtue up the sides of my springform pan.  I think it makes a nicer presentation.

Here is the recipe:

• 40 thin chocolate wafers, ground fine in a blender or food processor (about 2 1/4 cups crumbs)
• 1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, melted
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter (I added 1&1/4 cup)
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1 1/4 cups well-chilled whipping cream
• 1/3 cup salted, roasted peanuts, chopped fine
• Garnish: lightly sweetened whipped cream and whole salted roasted peanuts

 

Preparation:

Reserve 1/4 cup cookie crumbs. In a bowl combine remaining cookie crumbs and butter and press into bottom and side of a 10-inch (1 1/2 quart) pie plate. Chill shell.

In a heavy saucepan dissolve sugar in milk over moderate heat, stirring, and remove pan from heat. Whisk in peanut butter and vanilla until combined well and cool in a bowl set in a larger bowl of ice water, stirring occasionally.

In another bowl beat cream until it just holds stiff peaks and fold into peanut-butter mixture with chopped peanuts. Turn mixture into shell, smoothing top. Sprinkle reserved cookie crumbs around edge of pie.

Pipe rosettes of whipped cream decoratively onto crumbs and top rosettes with whole peanuts. Freeze pie, uncovered, until frozen hard, about 5 hours. Pie may be made 2 days ahead and frozen, covered with plastic wrap and foil after 5 hours.

Let pie stand in refrigerator 30 minutes before serving.

Enjoy ~