Milky Way Pie

Milky Way pie

Be honest: if you had leftover homemade caramel in your fridge, what would you do?

It’s been on my mind every day: it’s sitting there! In my fridge! Just staring at me! All plump and deep-amber colored! I can’t let another day go by! I have to do something!

So I did the simplest possible thing: I lined a pastry crust with the caramel, and then piled chocolate cream filling on top of that. Like a pie version of a Milky Way bar.

And it turned out really yummy. This particular batch of caramel was pretty dark, so it gave the pie some lovely low notes. The hint of coffee and the unsweetened cocoa in the chocolate cream helped as well.

I will say this, though: if I did Milky Way redux, I would reduce the amount of chocolate in the chocolate cream. As a stand-alone pie, this chocolate cream is terrific; it addresses my chronic complaint that the chocolate in most chocolate cream pies is wayyyyy too wimpy. But with the caramel, I think I’d like a slightly lighter version of chocolate filling. So give that a try if you make this, and comment on the blog here to let me know how it turns out!

Here are pictures from my Milky Way Pie adventure, but you don’t need a recipe, because the component parts are all in the blog already. Just follow my recipe for chocolate cream pie, and make the caramel from the Caramel Apple Lattice-Top Pie.

I made my chocolate pastry cream, just like it says in the chocolate cream pie recipe. Here it is, chilling with plastic wrap on the surface to keep a film from forming.

Here’s the pie dough, fully chilled and ready to blind-bake: it’s lined with parchment and partially filled with dried beans.

Once the crust is baked and cooled, it’s time to pour in the caramel.

Then the fully chilled chocolate cream filling:

I had to chill the finished pie at least 6 hours to get the firmness I wanted in the caramel and the filling so it held its shape when I cut it.

I am a little embarrassed to show you this pie without the whipped cream that should be its crowning glory. But I was plum outta heavy cream. Sorry! I hope when you make this baby you will plop a generous dollop of whipped cream and shaved chocolate on top.