Chocolate Cream Pie

The best Chocolate Cream Pie Recipe. This Chocolate pie has a homemade chocolate pudding pie filling, a buttery flaky homemade pie crust, and is topped with peanut butter whipped cream. This easy chocolate pie is a great make ahead dessert.

Hi! Just popping in to share this chocolate cream pie recipe! I love making homemade pies, and this easy chocolate pie is a favourite of mine. We start with my homemade pie crust, then add a smooth chocolate pudding, then you can finish it either with mounds of whipped cream topping, or take it one step further and add a peanut butter whipped cream. Chocolate Cream Pie is a great addition to a dessert table, and is super easy to make ahead of time! You really can't go wrong with a pie with chocolate.

This is my first ever chocolate pie I've ever made! They aren't really a thing in New Zealand. And what better recipe to use than one from my lovely friend Erin's new book, 'The Fearless Baker',.

Despite only having met Erin IRL a handful of times, (2021 note: turns out we became besties, and I miss her millions!) I am super lucky to be able to call her a friend, and am so proud of this amazing book! It's full of all kinds of incredible gems to help you overcome any fear you may have in the kitchen. There's foolproof tips, and recipes for almost every baked good you can imagine. I definitely see a chocolate puff pastry dough happening very soon in my life. Congrats Erin, the book is AMAZING! If you don't have a copy already, you can get your hands on a copy here!

How to Blind Bake a Pie Crust

The process for blind baking a pie crust is pretty simple. It takes a little practice to get the crimp on the crust right, but par baking is a great skill to know how to do!

The reason we blind bake a pie is for a pudding pie like this chocolate cream pie, you need the pie crust to be fully baked as it is obviously going to go in the fridge with pudding inside. Blind baking is similar to par baking, but differs in that a blind bake cooks the crust fully, whereas a par bake partially bakes it so that it is set before going into the oven at a lower temperature.

• Fill with beans or weights - Prick the crust all over, then cover with a crunched up piece of parchment paper. Fill the crust right to the edges with either weights or beans.
• Bake with parchment paper - Bake the pie crust for 15-18 minutes with the weights in, until the edges are beginning to golden, then remove the weights and return the crust to the oven. This second bake is just for a few minutes and will set up the crust that was covered by the paper. Bake until the crust is evenly golden brown. Do not worry if it puffs up here - it will sink back down.

You can blind bake crust ahead of time - just leave it to cool then store lightly wrapped in plastic wrap in an airtight container for up to a day.

To get all my tips and tricks for a foolproof homemade pie crust, check out my post: How to make pie crust

How to make chocolate pie filling

Once the crust has been blind baked it is time for the chocolate pie filling. This chocolate pudding pie was the first I had ever made and there's really no point in making my own chocolate pudding recipe, as Erin's is very, very perfect and super easy to make.

• Melt chocolate with milk and cream. A hot milk mix is the base of this chocolate cream pie recipe. Chocolate, cream and milk are melted together. Using chocolate rather than cocoa powder gives a super intense delicious chocolate flavor.
• Combine egg yolks, sugar, and starch. A game changer tip Erin taught me is to combine the sugar and the starch together ahead of mixing with the yolks. This helps remove any lumps that may be in the corn starch.
• Temper the egg mixture. This is done by pouring the hot milk mixture into the egg mix, giving it time to come to temperature more slowly than if you added the egg to the milk. This helps prevent lumps - make sure that you are whisking the whole time!
• Cook until thick. Pop the chocolate pudding pie filling back onto the stove and cook until thick - you want it to come to a 'first boil' which is where there are single large bubbles in the middle of the pot rather than lots of small ones. Cook the filling until it is nice and thick.
• Add to the crust. Add the chocolate pudding pie filling to the blind baked pie crust. If you are worried about there being lumps, you can strain it through a sieve into the pie crust just to make sure.
• Leave to chill. Press a piece of plastic wrap against the edge of the filling, and leave to set completely.

How to line a pan with pie dough

Make sure you start with nice cold pie dough - ideally it will have been chilling for at least two hours or up to overnight.

• Roll out your crust - I like to use a wooden french rolling pin for pie crust but you can use whatever you like! Roll to a circle a little larger than your pie pan.
• Transfer your pie dough to the pan - Flop the dough into the pan and make sure to settle it within the pan so that it doesn't slump.
• Trim if needed - If you have loads of overhang, or your dough isn't a perfect circle, you can trim the edges with some kitchen shears
• Fold and tuck the edges under - Tuck the edges of the crust under themselves to form an edge on your pie dough - this will be what you crimp.
• Chill - At this point, pop your pie dough into the fridge just for a wee bit to allow it to chill down before you crimp.
• Crimp - I like to keep this pretty basic and just do a thumb and fingers crimp, but you can do whatever you like here.
• Chill again - You can freeze your crust here if you want, but I prefer to chill it for about half an hour instead, which I find helps it to keep its shape well in the oven when baking.

Frequently Asked Questions

• Can this be made ahead of time?
  Yes. This chocolate cream pie can easily be prepared ahead of time. Make the pie dough up to two days ahead, and you can add the chocolate pudding filling the night before. Put the peanut butter filling on the day you serve.
• What did you use to pipe the peanut butter cream?
  I used a large french star tip - ateco #867
• Can I leave off the peanut butter?
  If you aren't a peanut butter person, regular old whipped cream on top would be delicious too.
• Which pie weights do you use?
  I have a couple of sets of these. It is important to make sure you have enough so that they go right to the edges of the pie crust. Dried beans or rice work too.

For more Homemade pie recipes, check out:

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