McCormicky-Libbyish Pumpkin Pie

Last month, I published "Which Pumpkin Pie?" that described ranges of ease and cost—fast and expensive, or laborious and cheap. For this article I'm publishing the method I used. For the ease, I bought frozen pie shells, canned pumpkin, and condensed milk. I already have cinnamon and nutmeg. Deviating from most recipes I ran across, I added vanilla and sesame oil (a favorite flavoring of mine).

Ingredients and Mixing
The table shows ingredients for the recipes from Libby's, McCormick, and me.

	Libby's	McCormick	Me
1 pie shell	✓	✓	✓
15-oz can pumpkin	✓	✓	✓
2 eggs	✓	✓	✓
14-oz can condensed milk		✓	✓
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice		✓
12-oz can evaporated milk	✓
3/4 C sugar	✓
1 t cinnamon	✓		✓
1/2 t ginger	✓
1/4 t cloves	✓
1/2 t salt	✓
1/2 t nutmeg			✓
1 t vanilla			✓
1 t sesame oil			✓

1. Preheat oven to 425°.
2. In a medium-large bowl, beat eggs. (Both recipes used wire whisks. Have also spotted use of a wooden spoon, a rubber spatula.)
3. Stir spices and fluid flavorings into the eggs mixture, then add the condensed milk and pumpkin.
4. Pour mixture into a pie shell. (I used the Pet Ritz deep-pie, 6-oz shell that already is in its own aluminum pan. Costs the same as the shallow, 5-oz pan.)
5. Place pie into a wider pan in case of filling overflow. (Libby's suggested a foil-lined pan.) Bake at 425° for 15 minutes.
6. Reduce temperature to 350° and bake for 40-50 minutes. Insert a knife to test for filling doneness. Libby's recipe says to insert the knife NEAR the center. (Forty minutes was perfect for my pie.)
7. Cool on wire rack (about 2 hrs).
8. Serve nekkid (~270 calories) or with whipped cream (ooh la la). :-)

Handy Links

• Libby's recipe—online, video
• McCormick recipe—online, video
• McCormick's Pumpkin Pie Spice ingredients: Cinnamon, Ginger, Nutmeg, Allspice, And Sulfiting Agents
• Making your own pumpkin pie spice
• Making your own allspice
• Fresh pumpkin advocacy
• Canned pumpkin advocacy
• Contrasting evaporated and condensed milks
• NYT recipe, graham cracker crust. I listed this link because I stated in my previous article a crumb-crust shell is not suitable, that it doesn't act as a liner during baking like a flour shell does. (By far, the recipes that I ran across used flour shells.)