Vegan Sweet Potato Pie
Vegan Sweet Potato Pie
There are two pies that are legitimately my areas of expertise. Sweet Potato Pie is definitely one of them. I love sweet potatoes so much that it was my food of choice for the extra leg in ultra marathons.
Sweet potato pie when roasted is so amazing. I love watching the sugar ooze while the sweet smell permeates throughout the kitchen.
Meet the Players
The recipe calls for roasted potatoes and condensed milk. I like roasting the potato because it caramelizes the sugars in the potatoes making it tastier than steamed.
The bonus to roasting is less water. It takes roughly an hour to roast and potentially a little more depending on how large your sweet potatoes are.
We’re going to use our time effectively by roasting roast sweet potatoes and making condensed milk. They can be completed at the same time. Condensed milk is simply two ingredients: your milk of choice and sugar.
Simmering this milk, not boiling will reduce the amount of milk by roughly 75%. The recipe calls for 1 quart (4 cups) of milk and after an hour there should be 1 cup remaining.
A tip I gathered from Stella at Serious Eats is to add cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla pods to the milk for simmering.
The subtleness of the aromatics is fantastic. Nutmeg can be really overwhelming, but I find with this method it’s the perfect amount.
The technique
Blending the ingredients while the sweet potato puree and condensed milk are hot allows the cornstarch to activate.
Much like my pumpkin pie, we want to assist the custard process due to the absence of eggs. Heat is important and blending while it’s warm solves that problem.
When blending hot ingredients, I leave the center of my blender off. Place a kitchen towel over the top of the lid and blend.
It allows the pressure to release and catches any sweet potato mess from taking over your cabinets.
Make sure to leave an opening at the top. Sealed air and heat are a bad combo. The pressure will make the lid pop off and you’ll have a sweet potato mess everywhere.
Final Thoughts and Notes:
Baking sweet potato pie is pretty cut and dry. The only real thing to be concerned about is not to overbake it. We don’t want a skin to form on the pie and we don’t want it to crack. Albeit if it does, it’s still tasty.
Check for doneness when the center is just set. Cracking the oven door open after it’s baked helps the custard to gradually come to room temperature.
The nice thing about this recipe is it actually gets better as it ages for a day or so. The spices have time to come together and it’s really a solid pie. Make sure to blind bake the pie crust. It really makes a difference.
Let’s Get Started!
Vegan Sweet Potato Pie
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Prep sheet pan with aluminum foil.
- Scrub, wash, and dry sweet potatoes. Pierce with a fork and place on a lined sheet pan. Roast for approximately 1 hour or until fork tender.
- While sweet potatoes are roasting, gather remaining spiced condensed milk ingredients. In a saucepan whisk together all ingredients and place it over medium heat.
- Allow it to come to a boil, drop the heat immediately and maintain simmer for 1 hour. Whisk every so often to help sugar not form at the bottom of the pan.
- Remove sweet potatoes from the oven and allow it to cool for 10-15 minutes. Bring the temperature of the oven down to 350 degrees.
- Peel off the skin and weigh out 697 grams or measure 3.5 cups. Set aside.
- After an hour the condensed milk will have reduced by almost 75%. Remove from heat, taking out nutmeg, cinnamon, and vanilla bean pods.
- Add milk to the blender with the remaining ingredients. Blend the ingredients until smooth.**
- Using a blind baked pie crust, add sweet potato mixture and bake for 50 minutes. If not using a cast iron pan, bake for 30-40 minutes.
- Once the pie is done baking, turn off the oven, pop the door open. Allow to cool for 10-15 minutes before removing from the oven.
- Cool for an additional hour and serve at room temperature or chilled. Enjoy!
Notes:
**Make sure to leave an opening at the top. Sealed air and heat are a bad combo. The pressure will make the lid pop off and you’ll have a sweet potato mess everywhere.
**Store in an airtight container and keep at room temperature for up to 3 days or refrigerate for up to 5 days.
