Bake

Pumpkin & Tahini Pie with Chocolate Pie Crust

October 15, 2018
4
23 Ratings
Photo by Rocky Luten
  • Prep time 1 hour
  • Cook time 1 hour
  • Serves 8-12
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Pumpkin & Tahini Pie with Chocolate Pie Crust
Ingredients
  • For the Chocolate Pie Crust
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1/3 cup water
  • 1 1/2 cups flour
  • 1/4 cup cocoa powder
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • For the Pumpkin & Tahini Pie
  • 1 15-ounce can pumpkin puree
  • 1/2 cup tahini, plus more for serving
  • 2 eggs
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground clove
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
  • 2/3 cup whole milk
  • Whipped cream, for serving
Directions
  1. Cut the butter into 1/2-inch chunks and place into the freezer along with the 1/3 cup of water to keep chill.
  2. Place the flour, cocoa powder, sugar and salt into a food processor and pulse to combine. Add in the chilled butter and pulse 5-6 times until the butter breaks down into pea-sized pieces. With the food processor running, stream in the water. The dough should look a bit crumbly at first but become damp enough that when pressed together with your fingers, it holds its shape.
  3. Remove the dough to a sheet of plastic wrap. Using the plastic wrap to assist you, press the dough into a disk. Wrap tightly and chill for at least one hour.
  4. When ready to bake, dust a work surface with flour. Roll the dough into a 12-inch round. It should be large enough so that there is at least a 1-inch border surrounding a 9-inch pie pan when inverted over top of the dough. Use a paring knife to trim the dough of any excess. Place the dough into the pie pan leaving the extra dough to hang over the sides. Tuck the edges under the dough and crimp the sides. Let the dough chill in the fridge while you make the filling.
  5. Preheat oven to 425°F.
  6. Place the pumpkin puree, tahini, eggs, sugar, cinnamon, salt, ginger, clove and nutmeg into a food processor. Turn the food processor on and puree until the ingredients are well combined. Remove the top, scrape down the sides and let the food processor run once more. This time, slowly stream in the milk. Once all the milk has been incorporated and the pie filling has become creamy and smooth, pour the mixture into the pie crust.
  7. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes. Lower the heat to 350°F and continue to bake for 35 minutes more. Remove from oven and let cool on a cooling rack until completely cool.
  8. Once the pie is completely cool, slice the pie and serve each portion with a dollop of whipped cream and a drizzle of tahini.

See what other Food52ers are saying.

5 Reviews

abakerinnyc December 18, 2021
This pie was almost inedible which was very surprising to me. We love tahini (one of our favorite recipes is a tahini chocolate chip cookie) and love pumpkin pie. The texture was okay but the filling really just tasted awful and left a bad aftertaste. It was very bland and not nearly enough flavor or spices. It literally tasted like you mixed pumpkin and tahini in a bowl and ate it straight. The crust was equally bland and bad, the cocoa powder and sugar did nothing for it. Even our guests didn't like it. The options were to throw this away or try to scoop out the filling, add spices, and turn it into a tahini pumpkin date shake. Even this barely masked the bad taste but at least the entire dish didn't go to waste.
Lauren M. November 23, 2020
Loved the richness and bitterness of tahini with the pumpkin. It was a great flavor pair, although the chocolate flavor in the form of cocoa powder doesn’t really come though. Maybe if the crust was coated with a thin layer of melted chocolate before baking there would be more of a chocolate presence. Everyone seemed to like it and it was so easy to make!
Kate J. November 30, 2019
Just didn't quite wow me. The tahini didn't have enough ginger and spice to compete with so it came out a little one note.
Trevor November 8, 2018
I just can't get through this recipe for pumpkin & tahini pie--there are so many typos. There are two in paragraph 2; one in paragraph 3; and three egregious ones in paragraph 4 (access dough?! Really? The same incorrect word used twice?!). Terribly written. I'm afraid to try the recipe for fear that it tastes as bad as the article reads.
a_dawn_g November 20, 2018
Trevor.... are you here to edit or bake? Seriously. If you’re here to edit, I can give you my 11 year olds school paper to grade while I bake this pumpkin pie. Seriously, get a life.