Butterscotch Pecan Pie Photo on Twitpic

One 9″ flaky pie crust. This is where people fall down on the job. I like this recipe and in fact have used it for the last dozen pies or so and it’s been foolproof. If you have to buy a crust, FINE (*eyeroll*) just don’t tell me about it.

You need to partially prebake the crust. I’m telling you this now because it adds, easily, an hour to the process.

Filling:

1 cup light corn syrup

1/2 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar (none of the light stuff, now)

1/2 stick unsalted butter, cut into pieces

1 cup butterscotch chips

Pinch of salt

3 large eggs

1 egg yolk

1 1/2 tsps. vanilla extract

2 cups chopped pecans

I’m going to assume that your crust has been prebaked, cooled and is sitting waiting for your filling. Set your oven to 350. Warm the corn syrup, the brown sugar and the butter over low heat in a saucepan on the stovetop. Stir until the butter has melted. Remove the mixture from the heat. Add the butterscotch chips and set aside for five minutes, shaking occasionally to distribute the chips and coat them with the liquid. Add salt and whisk to smooth.

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs and the yolk until frothy. Add the vanilla and continue to whisk. Add the hot liquid and whisk until smooth. Add the pecans and stir gently to distribute. Pour filling into the cooled pie crust. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes at 350, turning the pie 180 degrees halfway through baking.

Cool finished pie on a wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

More than a year ago, facing a half empty nest, I turned to pie. I decided I would learn, through trial and error, practice and reading, to make really fantastic pie. I blogged about my pie adventures, calling the new category Life of Pie. I began baking my way through the 300 pie recipes in this book growing in confidence despite the occasional pie failure.

Then came the Pie Down.

Undaunted, I continued to bake, even making a Peaches n’ Cream pie and a Smoothest Peanut Butter Pie for an event attended by his highness, The Food Geek who found them delicious.

Last Friday, I took the day off work and for 13 hours baked myself silly, creating seven total pies. Three of them were entered into C’ville Pie Fest, three were donated to the raffle to benefit PACEM and one (due to family demand) stayed at home.

The C’ville Pie Fest was nothing short of amazing — 27 bakers, more than 30 pies, a star-studded panel of judges and lots of money raised for a wonderful charity.

No, I didn’t win. (Sigh.) But I’ll have you know that two of the judges awarded perfect scores for my Butterscotch Pecan Pie, so put that on your fork and eat it.

Listen to Coy Barefoot and Brian Wheeler describe my Butterscotch Pecan pie.

And look at these tweets from @cmaisannes

pie tweets

Of course, I (and the other 26 bakers) owe it all to this guy, the undisputed King of Pie:

The man behind the pie @stevewhitaker #cvillepiefest. on Twitpic

Next year, we’re going statewide — so be on the watch for Virginia Pie Fest — and yes, I’ll be back for the win.

Smooth Criminal Peanut Butter Pie

Smooth Criminal Peanut Butter Pie

Charles Owens aka @superbalanced took this photo of my first-ever peanut butter pie. I changed the recipe to add chopped Reese’s peanut butter cups to the topping. This was one of two pies I made for #burgersummit yet another gathering of Twitter friends and foodies. I’m pretty pleased with the way this pie turned out and will make it again sometime. The recipe came from Mrs. Rowe’s Little Book of Southern Pies by Mollie Bryan. Buy a copy on Amazon today! (Mollie – hope you don’t mind the plug!).

Cant Beat It Peaches n Cream Pie

Can't Beat It Peaches 'n Cream Pie

The second pie, which I’ve made before, was one of my favorites — a very seasonal pie, there’s only a small window in which to bake a fresh, just picked, locally-grown peaches peach pie. (Yay, Crozet!) and that window is open RIGHT NOW, my friends. Photo of said pie, also from Charles Owens. Again, the pie was praised, and I was delighted.

Right now, my oven has a peach and blueberry cobbler baking and it smells heavenly in my kitchen. Sorry, Mistie. Had to share.

If you’re dying for a Marijean Jaggers pie, I suggest you mark October 3 on your calendar and start saving your lunch money. I will be competing in the C’ville Pie Fest and contributing a pie or pies to the charity pie auction (proceeds to benefit PACEM, the area’s winter homeless shelter.)

OK, so I didn’t win the Pie Down. But you know, I feel just as good about the whole experience as I would if I had won. (And I’ll be back. Rocky Balboa didn’t win his first fight, either.)

The Pie Down was so much fun — so many people were there and those who weren’t were following along online. It’s a fantastic social media/community building story, appropriately covered by the Daily Progress and NBC-29 (traditional media) as well as the place where it all started: Twitter.

There are SO many people to thank and recognize, so many who made the C’ville Pie Down a huge success:

Steve Whitaker, who took the ball and RAN like Forrest Gump

Jamie Schwartz, who wondered, online, who makes the best pie and who gave prizes to both competitors (because she’s just sweet like that)

Joe Meade, judge and enthusiast, who brought his four adorable children to the event

Cindy Maisannes, judge and cheerleader, promoting the heck out of the Pie Down all along

Sara Gould, judge who loves the chance to meet up with the C’ville Twitter gang (she works in Crozet and doesn’t often get to see us)

Mayor Dave Norris, (yes, he’s my personal friend Dave, too) who remained impartial and as usual, showed up without his security detail to mingle amongst the people.

Congressman Tom Periello for actually showing up, to the delight of many, because we invited him via Twitter.

A HUGE thank you to Mollie Bryan, our special guest; cookbook author and pie-love spreader, Mollie gave Brian and I each a copy of her new book, Mrs. Rowe’s Little Book of Southern Pies which is delightful (yes, I read it last night) and deeply appreciated.

Thank you to Barbara Hutchinson of the Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport, who donated a fabulous prize basket filled with all kinds of baking and cooking goodies (and my consolation prize of a very appropriate bottle of wine).

To Dan at Mudhouse Coffee for being an incredibly generous and wonderful host. (We love coffee with our pie!)

To Jennifer McKeever, esquire, who notarized the results, which means it’s official, Brian Geiger is the C’ville Pie Master (of spring, 2009; no, I’m not bitter).

Thank you to all of you who attended (and WOW there were a LOT of you) and/or followed along online. Photos and video of the event will appear on www.cvillepiedown.com in the next week or so.

And finally, the biggest thank you of all must go to The Food Geek himself, Brian Geiger, for accepting my “INSANE” challenge, for driving his wife Melanie nuts with his persnickety picking of perfect strawberries, for practicing pies (because I made him) and for showing up. Brian, you’re wonderful, and your pies are too.

I plan to return (and hope I’m not the Susan Lucci of local pie competitions) in the fall for the second Pie Down, planned for Crozet. I’m already thinking of apple pies, and pumpkin pies . . . and I bet you are, too.

A bit of a setback . . .  I’ve trashed my first batch of crust. It just didn’t meet my standards. It’s tough to judge the amount of water when it’s this hot, but not really humid. So it’s 2:30 in the afternoon and I’ve started from scratch (pun unintended). I have one pie I’m progressively happier with, in the oven.

For a moment, I considered making a pie I’ve never actually made before . . . my husband, wisely perhaps, has advised against it, but that doesn’t stop me from considering it, even now.

For those of you on piewatch . . . this is where it stands.