Coconut Custard Pie - So Easy!

Jan here, with another favorite summer recipe!

This one is a rerun from BEFORE - before Carrie and Josh's wedding, before Jacob and Katie's wedding, before our long-awaited move into the Hills, and before Benjamin and Heather's wedding (Squee! That one was only two days ago!)

I do miss the days when the adult children were all living at home, but we knew at the time that when they started moving out, it would happen quickly - and it did! Between June 2016 and July 2019 all four of them flew the nest. If you're counting weddings and children, you're right - one son is not yet married. :-)

But back in those days, my kitchen was well-used and desserts were made much more often. It works out better when there are more people to help eat the goodies. Just sayin'!


Coconut Custard Pie

Ingredients: 

2 cups milk

2 1/2 cups flaked coconut

4 eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup all purpose flour (or bisquick)

3/4 cup white sugar

2 Tablespoons butter, softened

Now, here's the hard part (just kidding).

Mix all the ingredients together and pour into a 9 inch greased pie plate.

Bake for 50-60 minutes at 350°, or until golden brown and a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.

This is one of those pies that makes its own crust, kind of like a clafouti, or those "impossible Bisquick" pies that were so popular years ago.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Back to 2020!

This pie was SO delicious that I still remember that flavor, even seven years later. I'm going to have to make this one again.

But not today! As of this writing, my husband and I are planning to drive slowly home from Benjamin and Heather's wedding, making two stops in towns that I've been longing to visit nearly my entire life!

I had many favorite authors when I was a child. Being a book-girl, I devoured stories by Beverly Cleary, Marguerite Henry, L.M. Montgomery, E.B. White, Mary O'Hara, Lois Lenski, Beatrix Potter, Jim Kjelgaard, Carolyn Haywood... I could go on for an entire blog post! Two other authors belong in that list - Laura Ingalls Wilder and Maud Hart Lovelace. 

If things go as planned, we will have spent yesterday afternoon in Mankato, Minnesota (aka "Deep Valley" from Maud Hart Lovelace's books,) and today in De Smet, South Dakota, where several of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books took place. The ten-year-old inside me is thrilled!

I'll share pictures next week!

Jan Drexler is an author by day who is addicted to counted cross stitch and sauntering through the Hills with her dear husband and their puppies - goofy corgi Jack and growing-fast border collie Sam. You can find Jan's books and other fun things on her website: www.JanDrexler.com.

Coconut Custard Pie - the story of a failed recipe

Jan here, facing what all writers love...and yet, dread.

It isn't the pie! Definitely not the pie!

It's the Looming Deadline.

Deadlines need to be met because writers don't work alone. We have agents, editors, cover artists, marketing folks (etc. etc.) counting on us to keep to the schedule!

(And don't we love deadlines, because that means another book is coming out!)

But the downside of deadlines is that our families get the short end of the stick - at least temporarily.

We end up serving box macaroni and cheese, or pizza, or even the dreaded "you guys are on your own tonight!"

I'm on some tight deadlines right now (yes, multiple deadlines = multiple books), and I started feeling bad for my poor husband. So I looked up a recipe I had made several years ago when I was on one of my first deadlines...

Coconut Custard Pie!

My mistake was that I tried to adjust it (with some help from a couple recipes I found on-line) to make single serving Coconut Custard Pie.

Oh, they looked good! I even made one with no sugar and low-carb, and the other one with regular ingredients.

But you'll thank me for NOT sharing the recipe! Once we took a few bites...well... We'll just say that the dogs enjoyed their share. :)

So I decided to share the original recipe again, AND make it for my husband once today's deadline has been met.

After all, I owe him, don't I?

So enjoy this recipe from 2013 -

Coconut Custard Pie

Over the weekend, with my new story down to the proof-reading stage (and not due until tomorrow!), I decided to treat my family to pie. Delicious, scrumptious...and EASY pie. I'm not kidding. It took longer to take the pictures for this recipe that it did to put it together.

Here it is: Coconut Custard Pie

Ingredients: 

2 cups milk

2 1/2 cups flaked coconut

4 eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup all purpose flour (or bisquick)

3/4 cup white sugar

2 Tablespoons butter, softened

Now, here's the hard part (just kidding).

Mix all the ingredients together and pour into a 9 inch greased pie plate.

Bake for 50-60 minutes at 350°, or until golden brown and a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.

This is one of those pies that makes its own crust, kind of like a clafouti, or those "impossible Bisquick" pies that were so popular years ago.

Here we are, back in 2017 :) Doesn't that pie look delicious? And super easy!

Like I said, I have multiple deadlines looming, but Sunday is still Sunday, and I do try to make it a day of rest. So we went out of town yesterday afternoon and enjoyed a trip to the Badlands.

If you've never been to Badlands National Park, it's worth a visit. We go a couple times a year, and while I love our winter visits, summer days are pretty nice, too.

And even though we love to look at the beautiful vistas and craggy peaks, what do the Badlands look like up close?

The Badlands have many faces. Sharp needle-like points in one area, and soft mounds in another. Mountains soaring above you, and then a few miles later vast canyons open at your feet.

But when you go to the Badlands, don't stay in your car for the whole visit. Stop at one of the overlooks to take a closer look.

When you get out of your car, this is what greets you. Steep sided gullies and a labyrinth of mounds and steep cliffs.

And when you take a close look at the surface of the hills...

Even though it looks spongy, the surface is rough and hard. It's similar to the popcorn ceilings you find in houses that were built during the early 1980's. Fascinating, isn't it?

Which National Park is your favorite one to visit?

Jan Drexler loves her family, her home, cooking and just about anything made by hand. But she loves her Lord most of all.

Stop by Jan's website to learn more about her books: www.JanDrexler.com

Old Fashioned Coconut Custard Pie

Youse know me.

I love me some old-fashioned stuff, yes I do! And when it comes to pies I like to play and practice, and while I was playing with this, I DID save the life of a tree frog who didn't realize an Arctic cold snap was coming and found himself numb with cold on my porch.... so I tucked him in a bundle of bushes, out of the wind, where he might not catch the cat's eye when he finally warms up.... like in a week? Maybe?

Wicked cold snap here, but I know other parts of the country dealt with this, too, so we're going to muster up!

I let Farmer Dave decide what kind of custard pie he wanted. The chickens are quite generous with their egg-laying capabilities in the spring, so delicious custards and puddings are a fun addition to scrambled eggs and fritattas and omelets.

You'll need a 9" pie pan lined with a single crust.  I brushed the pie crust with the whisked egg white and then layered the coconut into the pie crust.

Filling: (For regular custard pie leave out coconut and coconut milk and use 2 1/2 cups whole milk instead)

3 large eggs and 1 egg yolk
1 egg white (in separate little bowl)
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup coconut milk
2/3 cup milk
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg (I used fresh nutmeg, but grated is fine, too)
1 1/4 cup flaked coconut

Whisk eggs, egg yolk, cream, coconut milk, milk, sugar, vanilla and salt in large bowl.

Sprinkle 1 1/4 cup flaked coconut onto pie crust. Pour well-mixed custard over coconut.

Set pie onto cookie sheet and bake in 400° oven for 40 to 50 minutes until filling is firm. (You can test filling by inserting butter knife into filling halfway between side and middle... If knife comes out clean, filling is set)

Cool. Chill thoroughly.

Delicious old fashioned pie with timeless taste!

I love trying new and old things.... and around the farm, life is always full of crazy.... Here's proof!!!

Baby girl having pizza after a busy day on the farm!!!!

And Baby Girl snitching out of Easter baskets!!!!

And.... hiding the evidence is CLUTCH!!!!

Down.... And then up!

She loves jelly beans, by the way!

And it seems I forgot to hit "Publish" so you're getting this mid-day when I actually got it together a WEEK EARLY....

My bad!

The Yank messed up, but the coconut custard pie.... and the little kid.... are totally worth it!

Find Ruthy in Seekerville at www.seekerville.blogspot.com , at her website ruthloganherne.com or her blog www.ruthysplace.com

And you know you can find her on facebook!!!!

Impossible Pie!

Hello, everybody! I'm baaaaaack! I've got a recipe my sister told me about. I wasn't too thrilled about the title because I already have enough trouble with the POSSIBLE recipes. But, I decided to give it a whirl.

 Photo credit: allrecipes.com

Here's the recipe I used at allrecipes. I should have read the reviews first, because after I got started, I read that almost everyone who was thrilled with the pie added MORE coconut and FEWER eggs. But it turned out all right.

(Frankenstein, Universal Studios, 1931)

Before everyone who is dieting grabs their pitchforks, lights the bonfire, and ties me to the stake- let me just say this pie is supposed to be healthy. Wait, that's not right. It's supposed to be low calories. No... wait, still not it. I think the deal is that the sugar and the protein are balanced, and therefore your body doesn't grab all the sugar and run wild with it. (Did I get that right, Susie?)

  The original recipe is:
 2 cups milk
1 cup coconut
4 eggs
6 TBS margarine
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp nutmeg

But you know me (or you should by now) and I made a few changes... not because I'm overly confident in the kitchen and think I know better, but because I didn't have nutmeg or vanilla. (I KNOW! What on earth happened in my pantry?? The vanilla and nutmeg sprites came by and cleaned me out.)

 So, I substituted a little cinnamon for the nutmeg and maple for the vanilla. (Hey, my options were cloves and peppermint.)  You throw all these ingredients into the blender. Really, just lob them in.  Hit the button. Then pour it into the pie pan.
                                       

(Good heavens. This is the point where I almost gave up. Two pans? Three? Down the drain?)

 I doubled the recipe because I'm deep-down an optimistic person and if it's a winning recipe, I wan there to be TWO delicious pies! Unfortunately, as I was pouring the mix into the pans, I started thinking about those eggs. Don't eggs fluff up? Won't these spill over? Am I dooming my nice, clean oven? I put them in, put a cookie sheet underneath (WHERE ARE THE COOKIE SHEETS?) and hoped for the best. As usual, I've realized it's Tuesday at the very end of Tuesday, specifically coming back from the library where I was working on edits.

 So, I couldn't wait around to see if the pies were going to go all Mt. Vesuvius on my oven. I had little kids to put in bed, since it was already an hour past their bedtime.
There... Done. Small people tucked in. Now for the great "pie watch".
While we wait, we can just chat. Pull up a chair, I'll make some coffee. We can talk about... life.
  Is it just me, or do you guys ever get the sense that we're all just a few steps behind? (Or for me, a whole day behind.) I just read an article where a psychologist and a physicist declared we were actually living in the past, perpetually, with no chance of escape. How? You see, we  process the world around us a fraction of a second after something has happened, so we never do live in the present... ever.
 It made me feel better. I will NEVER CATCH UP so I'm just going to stop trying! I love science.

Speaking of other wonderful things, don't you love this art by Kristy Zink? I gave away a picture like this on my blog, and she sent me one, too! I think these Austen girls are soooo cute! Now I have to find the perfect frame!

Well, that went fast. Maybe because we got lost on etsy... But the oven timer went off and I peeked... afraid of what I would see! Some reviews said it took almost 2 hours to cook, and they were still liquid in the center. Mine look... not too bad! I think I'll take them out to cool. And miracle, the oven did not get the Mt. Vesuvius treatment!

But getting it out of the pan proved difficult, even after waiting about half an hour. I think this is one of those dishes where we need to distract the guests with a pretty tea cup or two.

All in all, definitely not an "Impossible Pie" in terms of difficulty and it was delicious tasting... but not great for presentation. I would give it a 5 if there was a Pie scale universally used in the cooking world.
  So, I say if you're ever in the mood to make a pie in a blender, this here's your recipe! Or, if you're weighing carbs against sugar, this is a good way to go. Otherwise, a fruit pie, a flan, or even a coconut pie might be a better choice.
 Maybe it will be better after a night in the fridge? I'll let you know after I have a piece for breakfast!
Until next time!

Deadline Dessert! Coconut Custard Pie

We've been a bunch of busy writers here! Just go back to Ruthy's post here or Mindy's post here to see what I mean!

And yes, here in the midwest, I'm working on a deadline, too!

(But don't we love deadlines, because that means another book is coming out!)

But the negative aspect of deadlines is that our families get the short end of the stick - at least temporarily.

We end up serving box macaroni and cheese, or pizza, or even the dreaded "you guys are on your own tonight!"

Over the weekend, with my new story down to the proof-reading stage (and not due until tomorrow!), I decided to treat my family with pie. Delicious, scrumptious...and EASY pie. I'm not kidding. It took longer to take the pictures for this recipe that it did to put it together.

Here it is: Coconut Custard Pie

Ingredients: 

2 cups milk

2 1/2 cups flaked coconut

4 eggs, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup all purpose flour (or bisquick)

3/4 cup white sugar

2 Tablespoons butter, softened

Now, here's the hard part (just kidding).

Mix all the ingredients together and pour into a 9 inch greased pie plate.

Bake for 50-60 minutes at 350°, or until golden brown and a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.

This is one of those pies that makes its own crust, kind of like a clafouti, or those "impossible Bisquick" pies that were so popular years ago.

Now that the pie is all done (and enjoyed by my family), let me tell you about this new story!

This is my "Ruthy story". I'd love to have a Tina, Debbie, Julie, Missy, Myra, Sandra, Glynna, Cara Lynn, Pam, Janet, and Audra story someday (those are the Seekers of Seekerville), but their names don't really fit in an Amish historical. (Did anyone notice I left out Mary? She may show up some day). 

But Ruthy? An excellent name for an Amish girl. Especially one who loves children.

It's a good thing she loves children, because she's been hired by Levi Zook to be his housekeeper.

You remember Levi Zook, right? He's the guy who wanted to marry Ellie in "The Prodigal Son Returns", and if you remember right, he has ten children.

A nice guy, for sure, but he just can't find a wife to take the place of his dear Salome who passed away last year, in the fall of 1935. And his children need a mother...until then, Ruthy will be a good substitute.

But will Ruthy be able to handle ten children? And what about the mess she left behind in Lancaster County?

I love this story, and I hope you will, too! I don't have a release date yet, but I'll keep you posted!

And, of course, here is a picture of poor Thatcher, post surgery.

He didn't have to wear the cone of shame for long...and by the next day, we couldn't tell he had even had surgery.

It's hard to keep a good man (or dog) down, right?