Ube pie is made with a creamy filling of mashed purple yam on a flaky cream cheese pie crust. It is a great addition to your ube recipes line up this holiday. Serve this along ube cake, or plain ube dessert and delight all your guests with an amazing holiday spread!
The Holidays are fast approaching and with the days going by so swiftly, it will be December pretty soon. I cannot stress enough how each day goes by so fast here in our household. Yes, I am a stay at home mom, but with a child that gets dropped and picked up at school between 2 and 1/2 hours, and a little one in tow, plus all the baking and blogging related work. My list is full every day.
I am not complaining though. I actually don’t need to stress about food and cooking that much because we live with my Nanay who is very much happy to cook the meals. I am pretty lucky to be able to focus on baking without needing to be sidetracked by what we need to eat (aside from dessert) each day.
Because of that, I get to play from time to time to feed my curiosity in baking. Such is the case when I made this ube pie.
Ube or purple yam is one of the well-known dessert ingredients in the Philippines. We enjoy it in many forms like ube cakes, ube ice cream, and the most traditional one is the simple and plain ube dessert, which is like a pudding or jam made of purple yam.
This ube pie is a product conceived from my cravings of ube and of a flaky pastry. Making it is easy (which I always say) but it is made of two elements: The crust and the filling.
And since making the filling is fairly simple, I am gonna focus a little bit on making the pie crust. Let me rephrase that, the making of the flaky cream cheese pie crust. ( wink)
Ube Pie: making the cream cheese pie crust
In a large bowl, combine 1 cup of flour, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/8 teaspoon baking powder. Whisk them together to combine. Add the cold cream cheese ( 64 g) and press it into the flour with your fingers. Also alternately smash it with your palms until your mixture becomes coarse, like in this photo.
Now add the cold, cubed butter ( 85 g).
Alternately press them into the flour with your fingers and smash it with your palms. This time leave the butter in flat, visible chunks but make sure it is incorporated into the flour.
Now to this crumbly, chunky mixture, Add the apple cider vinegar and the heavy cream. Incorporate the liquids into the mixture until the dough is almost coming together when pressed by your palms.
Gather the dough into a ball and flatten it into a disc. Wrap it with plastic and refrigerate for 4 hours to overnight.
After the chilling, let the dough stand in room temperature for a few minutes, then roll it out to a thickness of 1/4 to 1/8 inch. Rolled to this thickness, the size of the dough should be enough to fit the 9 inch pie pan with a little extra.
Wrap the dough around the rolling pin, gently lift it towards the pan and center it down. Tuck the edges, trim the excess. Using your fingers or a fork, make some decorative borders on the edges. Or simply make it neat by pressing with your fingers.
Refrigerate the pie shell for at least 4 hours or overnight until you are ready to make the filling and bake.
And that’s it for the crust!
For the filling, you have to thaw the frozen ube ahead, then steam it for about 30 minutes until it is soft and mashable. I bought my frozen ube from Asian supermarket, and they are the grated ones.
Bake the pie at 425 F for 15 minutes, then lower the temperature to 350 F. Place a foil ring on top of the pie to prevent over-browning, then bake for 35-40 minutes more. I usually place the foil ring once I notice that the side crust is getting brown too early, which is after the first 15 minutes. It may be different depending on your oven.
Pointers for Making Ube Pie
- A foil ring is just a piece of foil which is slightly larger than your pie. It has a circular opening cut into the center to expose the filling but covering the side crust. Covering the pie with a foil ring ensures the filling is exposed to the heat but the crust is covered, therefore preventing it from getting burned.
- Be sure to work quickly when you make and roll the dough. You want to keep everything cold. The butter should not be warmed in the process to ensure a flaky pie crust.
I truly enjoyed this recipe as it combines two of my favorite things: Ube and a flaky pastry. The buttery crust is perfect with the moderately sweet filling.
You have to try this!
Check out my other pie/ tarts recipes:
Ube Pie
A simple ube pie made with ube custard filling nestled in a flaky cream cheese pie crust.
Ingredients
FOR THE CREAM CHEESE PIE CRUST
- 1 c all purpose flour
- 1/8 tsp. baking powder
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 64 g cold cream cheese
- 85 g unsalted cold butter cut into mini cubes
- 1 and 1/2 tbsp cold heavy cream
- 1 and 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
FOR THE UBE CUSTARD FILLING
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 stick butter softened
- 2 large eggs lightly beaten
- 2 cup mashed ube from frozen grated ube, thawed, steamed and mashed to measure 2 liquid cups
- 3/4 cup heavy cream
UBE WHIPPED CREAM TOPPING
- 3/4 c heavy whipping cream
- 2 tbsp. icing sugar
- 1/4 tsp. ube flavoring
Instructions
MAKE THE PIE CRUST
- In a large bowl, combine flour, salt and baking powder. Add the cream cheese and incorporate it into the flour mixture by pressing it with your fingers and smashing with your palms. Work quickly until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Add the cubed cold butter and incorporate it into the flour by pressing with your fingers but leaving the butter pieces just flattened and still visible. The mixture should look crumbly with big pieces of crumbs from the addition of butter.
- Add the cream and apple cider vinegar and combine until dough is almost coming together. Gather it into a ball, flatten into a disc and wrap with plastic. Refrigerate dough for about 6 hours or overnight. On a floured surface, roll the dough to about 1/4 to 1/8 inch thick and gently wrap it around the rolling pin. Lift it gently over the pie pan, lower and center it down and tuck the dough into the sides of the pan. Cut excess dough on the edge of pie pan and use your fingers or a fork to create decorative borders. Refrigerate dough for at least two hours.
MAKE THE FILLING
- Steam the frozen grated ube for about 30 minutes until soft. Mash with a fork and set aside.
- Preheat oven to 425 F. Cream butter and sugar in a large bowl, add the eggs and combine. Add the cream and 2 cups of mashed ube and combine ingredients until smooth. Pour filling into the prepared pie shell and set it on top of a baking sheet. Bake in the preheated oven at 425 for the first 15 minutes. Lower temperature to 350 F. Place a foil ring on top of the pie to prevent the side crusts from over browning. Bake for another 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted at the center of the pie filling comes out clean. The filling may be very slightly wobbly but the center is set. Let cool completely, and if possible, refrigerate for at least 4 hours before topping with cream and slicing.
- To make the ube whipped cream, Add heavy cream, icing sugar and ube flavoring in the bowl of stand mixer. Whip on medium to high speed until firm peaks form. Do not over beat.
- To make a foil ring. Cut a piece of foil that is slightly larger than the prepared pie shell. Cut an opening in the middle so that the filling is exposed but the side crust is covered. Place this foil ring on top of the pie, making sure it is properly aligned, that is, the filling is exposed and the side crust is covered. Put foil ring around 20 minutes into the baking time or when you observe that the side crust is browning too soon.
Recipe Notes
Preparation time does not include chill times for the dough.
Cream cheese crust adapted from The Pie and Pastry Bible by Rose Levy Berenbaum.
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