French Silk Pie with Pretzel Crust
This French Silk Pie with Pretzel Crust is sweet, salty, and luscious!! Adding a pretzel crust to a classic chocolate pie provides pure bliss with every bite!
French Silk Pie with Pretzel Crust
Some recipe challenges throw me for a loop like this month’s Improv Challenge hosted by Kristen of Frugal Antics of a Harried Homemaker. Fish and Chips? What does a baker do with this? I know the hubby would have liked a tuna casserole topped with potato chips, but I just couldn’t go there. With a little brainstorming, my sweet tooth led me to a pie crust made with Goldfish Pretzels…and I filled it with my family’s favorite French Silk pie filling with chocolate curls made from semi-sweet chips (I gave them a couple options…and they all picked the richest most decadent filling…duh).
Did you all know I met Kristen in Orlando at the Food Blog Forum? She’s as sweet as can be. And I hung out with my buddy, Kim, of Cravings of a Lunatic, too.
Tips for Food Bloggers:
Here are some of the most useful pointers I learned at this excellent food blogger conference:
- Don’t be shy…approach sponsors and sell yourself and your blog. I need to follow the lead of my ultra-smooth and savvy blogger friends.
- Bring a decent camera…my iPhone took less than desirable photos, especially indoors. Bring chargers, cords, extra memory cards.
- Know what you want to say when formulating a blog post…create a mood, feeling, voice, and message.
- If you’re a bit camera shy, make a how-to video using snapshots…and set it to music.
- Experiment with directional lighting…see what effect you prefer.
- Try out different textured backgrounds…explore your home improvement stores for flooring samples, tile, etc.
- Clear your site of broken links for better SEO (try Free Broken Link Check).
- Don’t duplicate content…either in post titles or content.
- Make sure you have Google authorship of your blog.
- Optimize your website for mobile devices (a large % of your page views are via mobile devices)
- On Pinterest: post to group boards, post in the evening or night, use vertical photos, and tag your photos
I will be attending IFBC in Seattle in May and Mixed in Virginia in November. Hope to meet some of you very soon!!!
Tips for Making a French Silk Pie
On to the pie! I’ve been making a classic French Silk Pie for years and it’s fun to shake up the recipe just a bit.
- I crushed the fish-shaped pretzels and mixed the crumbs with brown sugar and butter before pressing the mixture into a 9-inch pie plate. The crust was baked, then filled with the most decadent chocolate filling you can imagine.
- The French Silk pie filling is not for the faint of heart since the ingredient list calls for a large quantity of butter, raw eggs, and chocolate that whip into a velvety chocolate ambrosia.
- I sent the hubby to the market to find pasteurized eggs…I was going to serve this diet buster to my neighbors and didn’t want to be the cause of a salmonella outbreak. Safest Choice is the brand of pasteurized eggs I (er, helpful hubby) can find locally.
- Make sure to use room temperature butter, otherwise, it will be very difficult to obtain the silky smooth texture needed.
- This dessert combination gives those who crave the sweet-salty combo a reason to swoon. One of my sweet girlfriends boldly declared, “This is the best thing you’ve ever made.” The whole gang seemed to enjoy a sliver of pie along with glasses of sangria…as we gathered on our friends’ deck with a lush garden view to relax, laugh, and tell tales. Summer is off to an excellent start.
French Silk in Pretzel Crust Recipe
The classic French Silk Pie with a sweet salty pie crust
Ingredients
Crust:
- 1 1/4 cups crushed pretzels (regular shapes or Goldfish)
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1/4 cup melted butter
Filling:
- 1 baked 9-inch pastry shell, cooled
- 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
- 1 cup Imperial brand granulated sugar
- 3 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled
- 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 3 large eggs
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350º. Spray pie plate with non-stick spray and set aside.
- Mix pretzels, brown sugar and butter. Pat into pie plate. Bake for 8 minutes and cool completely.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar for about 2 minutes, till light and fluffy. With mixer running, gradually add melted chocolate and the vanilla. Add eggs, one at a time, beating at medium speed for 5 minutes after each addition. Pour filling into cooled crust. Cover with plastic wrap, and chill for at least 4 hours.
- Before serving, whip one cup of heavy cream, adding sugar and vanilla to taste. I also add an envelope of Whip-It to stabilize the cream. Garnish with chocolate shavings if desired.
Nutrition Information:
Yield:
8 servingsServing Size:
1 sliceAmount Per Serving: Calories: 450Total Fat: 26gSaturated Fat: 16gTrans Fat: 1gUnsaturated Fat: 9gCholesterol: 124mgSodium: 217mgCarbohydrates: 48gFiber: 3gSugar: 32gProtein: 7g
57 Comments on “French Silk Pie with Pretzel Crust”
Kinda a newbie to cooking.looks like this doesn’t get cooked after the addition of the eggs,right?
You’re exactly right…the raw eggs are what gives the pie its silky texture. If your market carries pasteurized eggs, you can use those (I always do when serving to company). That will eliminate the chance of salmonella. Safest Choice is the brand I find around here.
What a fabulous pie!
Lizzy,
Another beauty. Great idea with the fish pretzels.
Maybe I’ll get to go to one of the blog events some day.
Annamaria
Liz, I love how you meet a fish challenge with chocolate! You’re my kind of girl! So glad I got to meet you at FBF, hope we get to meet again soon.
Beautiful! And good golly now I have to make a French Silk Pie!
I am late getting around to see everyone’s improv posts. Your pie looks fantastic…..I am glad you were able to use “fish” in a dessert.
It was so great to meet you in person. I am hoping to get to some northern conferences in 2014. Maybe we will meet up again. In the mean time, have a wonderful time on all of the rest of your adventures!
What a smart take on fish and chips! French Silk is my favorite, and that salty pretzel crust makes it even better.
Probably my favorite dessert is French Silk Pie; my crust has a combination of graham crackers and pecans but after making another dessert recently with a sweetened pretzel crust I can really imagine how good this would be. Looks fabulous!
Looks perfect. Such a decadent way to enjoy fish and chips.
Mimi
What a creative use of the ingredients. Love the blogging tips also, thank you.
Wow.. such a pretty pie! I love the idea of a pretzel crust. Delicious!
I agree–this would be the best thing I had ever tasted! Looks wonderful.
Clever idea. I could do this! I’m not a fishy person so I am so glad Kristen stretched our imaginations a bit. Thanks for the idea.
Wishes for tasty dishes,
Linda @ Tumbleweed Contessa
Someday I hope to join you guys at a conference. ๐ Loved all the tips. This pie looks creamy dreamy good. ๐
How cool that you got to meet Kristen and Kim! Your pie looks simply amazing. I love the idea of a pretzel crust; genius!