Nutella French Silk Pie

Nutella French Silk Pie - Nutella and dark chocolate mousse pie. A variation on the very popular French Silk Pie, but with no raw eggs. This pie is light and airy, while being rich in flavour. Topped with silky whipped cream to finish, it makes the perfect, easy dessert. The filling is no bake, and it will be a huge crowd pleaser with anyone who loves chocolate.

Nutella French Silk Pie

Somehow, putting food on my little corner of the internet has led to some ridiculously awesome opportunities. A couple of weeks ago, just before we went home to New Zealand, Rich and I flew to Madison, Wisconsin to visit the Sub-Zero, Wolf, and Cove headquarters! We toured their factory, which is like a crazy awesome real life version of ‘how it’s made,’ and learned all about the history of the company, and what goes into making their beautiful appliances. I have been a huge fan of their products for a while now - we had no gas in our apartment so I relied completely on the Wolf Gourmet counter top oven for all of our meals, as well as everything for the blog, for three months, and it legitimately saved my life. Sub-Zero, Wolf, and Cove make incredible refrigerators, cooktops, ovens, and now dishwashers (we got to preview the new Cove dishwasher!), so it was amazing not only seeing how they were made, but to meet some of the people behind the company.

A trip to Sub-Zero, Wolf, and Cove HQ

Aside from touring the factory, a good chunk of our time was spent at the barn and organic garden, located on the company’s campus called Harvest Haven. Sub-Zero, Wolf, and Cove are committed to not only making quality appliances, but sharing their love for food with others at the Harvest Haven facility. The modern barn is beautifully built and houses one of the most kitted out kitchens I think I will ever see in my LIFE. Here we ate a whole range of incredible meals, paired perfectly with wines, while head chef Joel Chesbro led us through the whole cooking experience, sharing his knowledge and expertise with us.

Right outside the barn is the Harvest Haven garden, where all of the ingredients used to make the meals in the barn are grown. Chef Joel gave us an amazing tour of the garden - we were there just as the seasons were changing, so got to see the transition of ingredients used in the meals - the last of the tomatoes for the year, and the beginning of pumpkin season (including an 800 pound whopper they have grown ‘just for fun’). It is always so inspiring to eat food that is not only delicious, but thoughtfully prepared. I place huge value on preparing meals based on what is local and in season, and this couldn’t be a better example of that.

Nutella French Silk Pie

This Nutella French silk pie was inspired by the dessert we had on the last night at Harvest Haven. After yet another incredible meal, we finished off the night with a mind blowing French silk pie. It was actually the first time I had eaten French silk pie, and I knew immediately I was going to have to recreate it. It was made with a very dark chocolate, and was perfectly balanced with just the right amount of salt.

I started researching French silk pie as soon as I got home and was surprised to find that it wasn’t made in the way I was expecting at all - most recipes start with creamed butter and sugar, which raw eggs and melted chocolate are added to, before being folded through whipped cream to make a mousse situation which is then poured into a blind baked shell to set up. The result looks amazing in pictures, but I was concerned that the butter would take away from the taste of the chocolate, and I wasn’t entirely stoked at the thought of adding raw eggs (I love eating leftover pie, and leftover pie with raw egg doesn’t really do it for me), so I was on the look for a workaround.

Nutella French Silk Pie with No Raw Eggs.

I eventually figured that the eggs should be able to be tempered, and started the filling by making a sabayon from egg yolks and sugar, which is tempered over a water bath before being whipped up. I also wanted to incorporate Nutella, which gave me all sorts of other issues with seizing and the order ingredients were added, but it was 100% worth the eight recipe iterations it took to land on this - the PERFECT Nutella French Silk Pie. No raw eggs, just amazing, Nutella dark chocolate mousse pie, which is impossibly light and piled high with whipped cream and finished with chocolate curls and chopped hazelnuts. This one is going to be my new go-to back pocket recipe, and I hope it is yours too!

A few wee tips for Nutella French Silk Pie

• I have included a recipe for a blind baked pie crust, but you can use your favourite method, or a blind baked store bought pie crust will work too.
• I used a USA pan pie pan for this, which was needed for amount of filling - so go for something a teeny bit deeper if you can.
• PLEASE follow the recipe for the filling carefully - things need to be weighed because it really does make a difference to how the pie turns out. Promise.
• The filling will set up in about 4 hours, but give it overnight if you can.
• If you can, add the cream just before you serve!
• I used 90% chocolate for this - it will seem intense, but it will be totally balanced out by the Nutella and cream in the recipe, so don’t be put off. It mellows out.
• I did a braid on the edge of my dough - I watched an online tutorial to make a five strand braid. If you want it to go the whole way round, it needs to be 29 inches long, alternatively you could braid in sections.
• The dough recipe here makes enough for two standard crusts without the braid, so if you are just doing a crimped crust, you can use the other for another pie - it stores very well wrapped in plastic wrap in the freezer.
• If you want to cool your crust quickly, and it will pop out of the pie tin, I usually make sure that it is set, and then cool it outside of the tin on the rack. If this makes you nervous, cooling it in the pie pan is totally fine!
• There are two quantities of cream in the filling - the first gets whipped up and used at the end, and the second is used to loosen the mixture before the addition of the Nutella.

For more Chocolate Hazelnut Recipes, Check out:

• Chocolate Hazelnut Cream Puffs
• Brownie Cake with Chocolate Hazelnut Filling and Mocha German Buttercream
• Chocolate Hazelnut Babka
• Nutella and Banana Sweet Rolls

Thank you so much to Sub-Zero, Wolf, and Cove for Sponsoring this post and having me in Madison! All opinions are my own.

Made this recipe and love it?

If you made this recipe then I would LOVE for you to leave me a review below to let me know how you liked it! Also, please make sure to tag me on Instagram if you make it!

A note on salt and oven temperature

It is important to note the type of salt that is called for in a recipe. I use Diamond Crystal salt throughout my recipes - if you use a different sort of kosher salt or regular table salt you will need to adjust accordingly as some salt is 'saltier' than others. Morton's salt is twice as salty, so you will need half the quantity. Same goes for a regular table salt. I am working to get gram measurements throughout my recipes for salt but still getting there.

All oven temperatures are conventional unless otherwise stated. If you are baking on fan / convection, you will need to adjust the temperature. An oven thermometer is a great investment to ensure that your oven is the correct temperature.

Using the double / triple function in the recipe card

You will notice that there is a '1X' '2X' '3X' button in my recipe card. This can be used for doubling or tripling a recipe. However, please note that this only doubles the ingredient quantities in the ingredients list and NOT in the method. If there are quantities or pan sizes in the method of the recipe (for example weigh out 150g brown butter), you will need to scale this number manually. It will also not change the baking time in the recipe so you will need to adjust this yourself too. It is always a good idea to read through a recipe fully before doubling it just to check this. If you would like to scale this recipe or convert for another pan size, use my calculator!

Tools and equipment

For a list of my go-to tools and equipment, I have a post you can refer to here.

Why is this recipe in grams?

I post my recipes in grams as it is the most accurate way to bake. Cups are not only inaccurate but they vary in volume worldwide. There is no way for me to provide one cup measure that works for everyone. However, posting in weight fixes this issue. If you would like the recipe in cups you are welcome to convert it yourself via google, but please do not ask me to do it for you as I am not comfortable providing a recipe using a method that I have not tested. Baking with a scale is easy, accurate, and also makes cleanup super simple. Here is the scale that I use if you would like a recommendation! Here's to accurate baking!

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