I had a lot of trouble with this pie. I had never made a custard pie before and there were a lot of factors in play. Custards have to cook at a low temperature while pie crusts have to cook at higher temperatures. And then I had thought to put this braid crust rim on the top, with the braids unfolding into tree branches. The branches fell into the custard, as you can see. I didn’t wait to put it in later because I was afraid that the braids wouldn’t’ have stuck to the edge of the pie. Luckily, the braids stick. Also, the custard browned a lot more than I expected. If I knew that were the case, I would have not glazed the rim with an egg wash.

I made this pie crust with a vodka trick with about 5 tbsp each of water and vodka. Besides that, it was the usual flaky crust. I edited the custard recipe from Purdy’s Perfect Pie book and used dried currants instead of fresh currants. Let’s hope it works out today when we taste them.

Tagged: basic flaky pastry, currant, heavy cream