Birthday Pie! Chocolate Silk Pie

In our house, we have a newer tradition. Instead of Birthday Cake, we have Birthday Pie. This started a year or so ago. I said to Trevor that he never eats more than 1 piece of the birthday cake and I end up eating the rest. He said I don't particularly like cake so why do you have to bake one? I said that is true - why bake one if I am the one who will eat it? Steve isn't big on it either unless it is Ebinger's Black Out Cake.

So, I said what if I bake a Birthday Pie? Well...that got a huge YES. So for Steves' birthday I baked a pie. It got eaten in 2 days.

With such a success under my belt, I decided to bake Trevor a Chocolate Silk Pie for his birthday. Last week I put a Pillsbury Crust in my pie pan, baked it off, and made homemade chocolate pudding. I put it in the cooled crust and then topped it with Cool Whip Free. Sprinkled some Chocolate Chips on top and served it. Well...another hit BUT Trevor said he would have preferred a pumpkin pie. I said I didn't bake a pumpkin pie because we had eaten 2 Costco Pumpkin Pies in the last 3 weeks. I was sick of pumpkin.

So here is the birthday pie.

French Silk Pie

3 oz unsweetened baking chocolate*
1 cup organic sugar
3/4 cup unsalted butter (1-1/2 sticks)
1.5 tsp vanilla extract
3 eggs
1 pie crust**
Cool Whip Free***
mini chocolate chips****

Place pie crust in an ungreased pie pan. Bake at 400 for 10-12 minutes until brown. Place on wire rack and let cool.

Melt chocolate (I used the microwave). Using steel blade in food processor, process sugar and butter until smooth.

With processor running, add melted chocolate and vanilla into feed tube. Add eggs, one at a time, until mixture is smooth. Pour into cooled pie crust. Chill for several hours or overnight. Top with whipped cream and chocolate.

Risa's notes:

* Original says to use 3 oz unsweetened chocolate. I used 3 oz Ghiradelli 60% cacao chocolate chips.
** original says 1-9 inch pastry shell, baked & cooled. I used a Pillsbury Pie Crust.
*** Original calls for French whipped cream.
**** original calls for chocolate curls. I didn't have any baking chocolate that i could use a peeler on so I used mini chocolate chips.

Serves 8
adapted from The Lambertville Community CBK
Posted by RisaG 10/20/09