The recipe for sugar cream pie is said to have originated with Quaker settlers who came from North Carolina in the early 19th century to settle in east-central Indiana. The recipe was likely invented out of desperation when apples or other fruit weren’t available. A favorite of the Pennsylvania Dutch, Amish and Shaker communities also had a hand in the growing popularity of sugar cream pie. Today the largest producer of the pies is Wick’s Pies of Winchester, Indiana, which makes 750,000 sugar cream pies a year. Fittingly, Indiana’s official state pie is the sugar cream pie. The dessert also is known as sugar pie, Indiana cream pie, Hoosier sugar cream pie, and finger pie.
Recipe Servings: 8
+ 2 hours resting
Ingredients
Crust:
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour, plus a bit to dust pan
- 1 tsp salt, fine
- 7 Tbsp butter, chilled
- ¼ cup water, ice cold
Filling:
- 1 cup sugar
- 5 Tbsp all-purpose flour
- Salt, pinch
- 2 cups heavy cream
- 1 cup half and half
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 Tbsp butter, chopped into pea-sized pieces
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp nutmeg
Directions
- Mix the flour and salt together in a large bowl.
- Add the butter. Rub and pinch the butter into the flour using your fingers to coat the butter pieces and form small pea-sized balls.
- Create a well in the center of the mixture and add water. Mix together with your hands.
- Pull away walnut-size pieces of dough and smear them using the heel of your hand. This technique is called fraisage, and it helps produce flaky layers.
- Form the flattened pieces into a ball and then slightly flatten it to form a disk. Wrap the disk in plastic wrap and chill it in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
- Remove the plastic wrap from the dough. Roll a floured rolling pin from the center of dough disk to the edge rotating the dough until the circle is an ⅛ inch thick and 12 inches in diameter.
- Wrap the dough around the rolling pin and lift the pin over the edge of a 9-inch glass pie pan. Gently unroll the dough over the pan. Lightly press the dough into the bottom and sides of the pan.
- Crimp the edge of crust by placing two fingers on the crust’s outside rim while placing one finger on the inside and pressing outward to form a V.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F
- Mix the sugar, flour, and salt until evenly blended. Add whipping cream and mix well.
- Combine the half and half, egg yolks, and vanilla together in a small bowl.
- Blend the dry ingredients with the wet ingredients, but do not beat.
- Pour the mixture into the pie pan and then sprinkle the butter around evenly on top of the pie.
- Sprinkle the cinnamon and nutmeg on top of the pie.
- Bake the pie for about 60 minutes. If the crust appears to be browning too quickly, cover it with foil. Check the pie to see if the center is cooked by gently wiggling the pie pan. The center should be slightly jiggly, but not sloppy and loose.
- Remove the pie from the oven and let it cool before serving.
For Crust:
For Filling:
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