French silk pie is not actually of French origin, but this decadent dessert's dreamy texture and elegant presence lives up to it sophisticated namesake. French silk pie is actually an American creation. In 1951 this pie was an entry in Pillsbury's third annual Bake-Off. Although it didn't take top honors, it has since become one of America's most beloved pies.
In my search for the perfect French silk pie recipe, I insisted on finding one that did not use raw eggs (keeping in mind today's salmonella fear factor). I also wanted a spectacular crust that could hold its own next to the luxurious filling. I decided upon a Pepperidge Farm Milano cookie crust using the double-chocolate variety.
Be forewarned: this recipe is not for the faint of heart. My maiden journey on the French Silk Road was a bit bumpy. Had this been my first pie attempt for this pie blog, I would certainly have been intimidated from the get go. But with 25 pies under my slightly expanding belt, I felt I had the confidence to tackle it. In fact, my new-found confidence got the best of me when I prepared this recipe. Make sure to follow the instructions exactly. There's a reason you must use a double-boiler method; it's to prevent the eggs from curdling which is exactly what happened in my first attempt when I cooked the custard over direct heat. And don't try to streamline the process by tossing the vanilla in with the melted chocolate rather than mix them in separately. This causes the chocolate to seize. Seasoned bakers know this is a cardinal sin but in my pie-baking brashness, I was oblivious to this obvious taboo.
Don't be deterred by this pie's pricier ingredients. The gourmet cookie crust and a good quality bittersweet chocolate are worth the splurge. And despite the fact you might dirty up several pots and bowls in the preparation process, it is definitely worth the extra hassle. One bite of this pie's incredible velvety goodness will have you exclaiming, "Vive le French Silk Pie!"
Crust:
3 cups Double Chocolate Milano Cookies (about 2 packages)
4 tablespoons butter, melted
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Place Milano cookies in a ziploc bag and crush with a rolling pin to make fine crumbs. Transfer the crumbs to a large bowl. Add the butter and mix well. Transfer the crumbs to a 9 1/2 inch deep dish pie pan, pressing them into the bottom and halfway up the side. Refrigerate for 10 minutes, then place on the center rack of oven and bake for 7 minutes. Cool thoroughly.
Filling:
1 cup heavy cream, chilled
3 large eggs
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons water
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 stick butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces and softened
With electric mixer on medium-high speed, whip cream to stiff peaks. Transfer to a small bowl and refrigerate.
Combine eggs, sugar, and water in a large heatproof bowl set over a medium saucepan filled with an inch of barely simmering water (don't let bowl touch the water). With electric mixer on medium speed, beat until egg mixture is thickened and registers 160 degrees, 7-10 minutes. Remove bowl from heat and continue to beat egg mixture until fluffy and cooled to room temperature, about 8 minutes.
Add chocolate and vanilla (separately) to cool egg mixture and beat until incorporated. Beat in butter, a few pieces at a time, until well combined. Using a spatula, fold in whipped cream until no streaks of white remain. Scrape filling into pie shell and refrigerate until set, at least 3 hours. Serve.
I've reached the halfway point on my fifty pie quest, and I would be remiss if I didn't include a rhubarb pie recipe to pay homage to my father who loved rhubarb. While my mother tended to her vegetable garden each summer, feeding our family a bounty of fresh greens and tubers, my dad focused on his crabapple tree and rhubarb plants. No fault to dear old dad, but crabapples and "rhubarf", as I jokingly named it, don't rank high on my list of delicious edibles. He would pickle the crabapples and spice them with cinnamon which rendered them just barely fit for consumption. With his prolific rhubarb harvest which started in the spring and lasted into the summer, he baked cakes and pies. I recall sticky bits of rhubarb slime in the cakes and pies with a bitter aftertaste despite the loads of sugar in the recipe. My dad, being the purist that he was, never made a rhubarb pie paired with berries that could have tempered the bite of that bitter stalk. If he had, maybe I would have developed an appreciation of it. So with deference to his beloved rhubarb but with consideration of my sensitivity to that nasty vegetable, I offer a strawberry rhubarb pie recipe.
I discovered this recipe in Southern Living magazine. What intrigued me was the crust which is rolled and cut into small circles which encase the fruit filling sandwich style. Because the crust/filling ratio favors more crust to filling, I was hopeful that the rhubarb wouldn't overpower my taste buds. I was right. The strawberries do a wonderful job of keeping the bitter rhubarb in proper submission and the delightfully flaky crust steals the show. Assembling the hand pies takes a little extra time but the end result is a charming plate of bite-sized hand pies with a superb crust and a burst of fruity filling.
Recipe:
3/4 cup finely diced fresh strawberries
3/4 cup finely diced rhubarb
1 tablespoon cornstarch
6 tablespoons sugar, divided
3 teaspoons orange zest, divided
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, cold
1/4 cup shortening, chilled
3 tablespoons ice-cold water
3 tablespoons orange juice
Parchment paper
1 egg yolk, beaten
1 tablespoon whipping cream
Sugar
Combine strawberries, rhubarb, cornstarch, 2 Tbsp. sugar, and 1 1/2 tsp. orange zest in a small bowl.
Preheat oven to 375°. Combine flour, salt, and remaining 1/4 cup sugar in a large bowl. Cut in butter and shortening with a pastry blender until mixture resembles small peas. Stir in remaining 1 1/2 tsp. orange zest. Drizzle with ice-cold water and orange juice. Stir with a fork until combined. (Mixture will be crumbly and dry.) Knead mixture lightly, and shape dough into a disk. Divide dough in half.
Roll half of dough to 1/8-inch thickness on a heavily floured surface. (Cover remaining dough with plastic wrap.) Cut with a 2 1/4-inch round cutter, rerolling scraps as needed. Place half of dough rounds 2 inches apart on a parchment paper-lined baking sheets. Top with 1 rounded teaspoonful strawberry mixture. Dampen edges of dough with water, and top with remaining dough rounds, pressing edges to seal. Crimp edges with a fork, and cut a slit in top of each round for steam to escape. Repeat procedure with remaining dough and strawberry mixture.
Stir together egg yolk and cream; brush pies with egg wash. Sprinkle with sugar. Freeze pies 10 minutes.
Bake at 375° for 20 to 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool 10 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature. Store in an airtight container up to 2 days.
Interesting rhubarb trivia:
Rhubarb is botanically a vegetable; however, a New York court decided in 1947 that since it was used in the United States as a fruit it was to be counted as a fruit for the purposes of regulations and duties. A side effect was a reduction in taxes paid.
The word rhubarb comes from the Latin word "rhabarbarum" which means "root of the barbarians." The Romans called people who ate rhubarb "barbarians."
The Chinese cultivated rhubarb as early as 2700 B.C. and used it medicinally as a laxative. The Greeks also harvested the spongy root, dried it, ground it into a powder, and used it as a laxative---the best in the known world. As early as the mid 1500's, it was much more expensive than the cinnamon in France. By the mid 1600's, rhubarb was double the price of opium in England.
Rhubarb root also produces a rich brown dye used for dyeing hair and clothing.
While a rhubarb stalk is edible, its leaves are toxic and can be used to make an environmentally-friendly pesticide.
The word rhubarb is often used by actors in a background scene to simulate real conversation since the word contains no harsh consonants and is difficult to discern by lip readers.
Rhubarb was sometimes given to children to induce vomiting (hence, my nickname of "rhubarf" is not too far-fetched!)
Rich cream pies. Butter laden crusts. Sweet gooey fillings. Friends have jokingly requested a diet pie to counterbalance four months worth of caloric goodness that is starting to weigh heavy on the scale. And since swimsuit season is fast approaching, a diet pie would fit the bill and maybe help some of us pie indulgers to fit the bikini!
In my quest to find a worthy diet pie, I immediately eliminated those recipes that called for fat free substitutes such as fat free cream cheese or fat free half and half. As my husband quips, the word fat is actually an acronym for "flavor and taste." So a zero fat recipe has zero flavor and taste. And here's the skinny on lots of those fat free items: they can be chockfull of artificial ingredients, and who wants a pie swimming in chemicals even if its calorie count is low as a limbo stick?
I first consulted, as always, Ken Haedrich's pie bible. I found a yogurt filling that looked worthy with a bit of tweaking. The crust, however, called for butter and graham crackers which wouldn't quite meet the diet pie requisites. So I scanned various websites and found a crust using Grape-Nuts cereal. For those of us old enough to remember, the spokesperson for the cereal used to be Euell Gibbons, a natural foods enthusiast who purported that parts of a tree were edible. He advocated cooking with neglected plants such as cattails, dandelion shoots, and stinging nettles. On a sidenote, I once took a survival course with my husband where we harvested and cooked the aforementioned plants. I can unequivocally say that if I used those ingredients in a pie, people would lose weight for fear of eating it!
But getting back to the crust issue, I decided to try a recipe using Grape-Nuts and apple juice which are both naturally low in fat. The crust baked up so crisply, I do believe it would cause a dental emergency if bitten into. Did you know that parts of a Grape-Nuts crust are inedible? But the pie pan thought quite highly of it as it tightly bonded itself to it and refused to let go.
As the pan and fused crust soaked in hot sudsy water, I returned to the drawing board. I found an oatmeal crust that looked hopeful. Using just a small amount of butter, this looked like the winning crust recipe. Indeed it was with its wholesome granola crunch.
The filling is versatile as you can mix and match any berry with any yogurt flavor. I used blueberries and a combination of vanilla and blueberry yogurt. With the creative yogurt flavors on the market, such as raspberry cheesecake and peach melba, this diet pie might fool the most discerning dessert lover. Despite its low fat content, this pie has high flavor and taste. We can indulge without guilt as we head towards swimsuit season. And if you desire, go ahead and garnish the pie with a stinging nettle. I know Euell Gibbons would approve.
Crust:
1 cup old-fashioned oats
1/2 cup oat flour (finely grind oats in a blender to make oat flour)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons melted butter
2 tablespoons apple juice or cider
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 9-inch pie pan with cooking spray. Stir together oats, oat flour, brown sugar, salt and cinnamon in large bowl. Stir in butter and juice until crumbly dough forms. Press dough into bottom and sides of prepared pie pan, moistening fingers with cold water, if necessary, to prevent sticking. Place pan in oven and bake 15 minutes to until light brown and bottom looks dry. Cool.
Filling:
One 1-pound bag frozen berries (not packed in syrup - if using whole strawberries, slice in quarters)
1/4 cup orange juice
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
5 6-ounce containers yogurt
Combine frozen berries, orange juice, and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until hot and the berries have released much of their juice, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle in the cornstarch and bring berries to a boil, stirring and gently boiling for 1-2 minutes until mixture is thickened. Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice. Scrape the berries into a wide bowl and let cool to room temperature. Once cooled, refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Open the containers of yogurt and drain off any whey liquid at the top. Mix all yogurt with a spoon until flavors are blended through. Spoon the yogurt into the cooled pie crust and smooth the top. Spoon the cooled berry filling over the yogurt. Cover loosely and refrigerate at least 2 hours until thoroughly chilled.
Ah, strawberries! Their seasonal debut on produce shelves is a sure harbinger of spring. After a long winter of heavy comfort foods, my palate craves light fruity flavors. A fresh strawberry pie will surely rustle my taste buds out of their long winter hibernation.
After enjoying the ease of crumb crust recipes for the past three pies, I once again tackle the rolled pastry crust, this time with an unusual added ingredient - vodka. Apparently alcohol adds moistness to pie dough without aiding in gluten formation, since gluten doesn't form in alcohol. I was impressed with such a scientific explanation but even more impressed with the end result. The crust was super flaky and flavorful and held up beautifully against the moist berry filling. Don't be alarmed that the dough seems too sticky. It rolls out easily between sheets of wax paper if you dust it well with flour.
When researching strawberry pies, I discovered that the filling runs the risk of being too soupy or too stiff. I imagine Goldilocks sampling various strawberry pies and proclaiming, "This pie is TOO goopy! This pie is TOO spongy!" I happened upon the perfect filling recipe that Goldilocks would deem "just right".
Instead of using gelatin or cornstarch exclusively which is to blame for the goopy and soupy texture extremes, this recipe uses cornstarch and pectin together resulting in the perfect consistency.
Make sure to avoid underripe strawberries and try to find berries uniform in size. I kept most of the berries whole and halved only the larger ones. Neatly slicing a pie filled with whole berries, however, is challenging. No need to fret, even if you're serving the pie to a fussy Goldilocks. Just camouflage the imperfections with globs of freshly whipped cream. Taste buds won't care if the pie doesn't slice up into a picture perfect wedge!
Crust:
1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/4 slices
1/4 cup chilled vegetable shortening, cut into 4 pieces
2 tablespoons ice cold vodka
2 tablespoons ice water
Process 3/4 cup flour, salt, and sugar together in food processor until combined. Add butter and shortening and process until dough just starts to collect in uneven clumps, about 10 seconds. Scrape down sides and bottom of bowl and redistribute dough evenly around processor blade. Add 1/2 cup flour and pulse until mixture is evenly distributed around bowl. Empty mixture into a medium bowl.
Sprinkle vodka and water over mixture. With rubber spatula, use folding motion to mix, pressing down on dough until dough is slightly tacky and sticks together. Flatten dough into a 4-inch disk. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 45 minutes or up to 2 days.
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Remove dough from refrigerator and roll out to a 12-inch circle between two sheets of wax paper. Place dough onto 9-inch pie pan, leaving a 1-inch overhang. Gently press dough into pan and fold overhang under itself, flush with the pie pan edge. Crimp the dough edge to flatten against rim of pie pan. Refrigerate crust until firm, about 15 minutes.
Remove pie crust from refrigerator, line with foil, and fill with pie weights. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove foil and weights, reduce oven temperature to 375 degrees, prick crust with tines of fork, and bake for 10-15 minutes longer until crust is golden brown and crisp. Cool to room temperature.
Filling:
4 pints (about 3 pounds) fresh strawberries, rinsed, dried and hulled
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 1/2 teaspoons Sure-Jell fruit pectin for low sugar recipes
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
Topping:
1 cup heavy whipped cream
2 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
Select 1 1/2 cups berries and process in food processor to a smooth puree. You should have about 3/4 cup puree. Whisk sugar, cornstarch, Sure-Jell, and salt in medium saucepan. Stir in berry puree, making sure to scrape corners of pan. Cook over medium-heat, stirring constantly. Bring to a full boil and continuing cooking for 2 more minutes. Transfer to a large bowl and stir in lemon juice. Cool to room temperature.
Meanwhile, add remaining berries to cooled puree mixture. Make sure to halve large berries. Gently fold with rubber spatula until berries are evenly coated. Scoop berries into pie shell. If any cut sides of berries face up, turn them face down. Arrange berries into an even mound. Refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, at least 3 hours.
When ready to serve, whip heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add sugar and almond extract and whip until stiff peaks form. Spread whipped cream on top of pie.
Spring officially began March 20, but way up north in Montana, Mother Nature pays no attention to the calendar. I joke that Montana's climate is bi-polar; it's as cold as the South Pole and as cold as the North Pole. I have endured yet another week of unwelcome spring snow, cold temperatures, and biting wind. To add insult to injury, our heater quit due to a flooded crawl space. I am insanely jealous of my sun-basking, sandal-clad southern friends who are reveling in the colorful profusion of spring flowers. Here I sit bundled in my snuggie, sipping hot tea next to a roaring fire, gazing out my window at depressing shades of gray. I am craving heavy comfort foods and am tempted to start baking some holiday pies just to keep in step with Mother Nature's wacky rhythms.
Desperate to infuse some color into the dreary monochrome of winter, I decided to try an orange pie featured in Ken Haedrich's cookbook. My dear friend Teresa who threw my 50th SurPIES party loves the color orange. I thought this pie would be perfect baked in the tangerine fiestaware dish I bought her.
The crust is a basic graham cracker recipe with an unusual added ingredient of pistachios which offer a fun flavor twist. The bright green hue of the nuts add some eye-popping color to the crust as well. The filling is akin to a key lime pie. You can use regular lime juice but I opted for key lime juice for that extra punch of citrus zing. This pie's happy color and sprightly taste reminds me of citrusy locales like Florida and California. Mother Nature may be stingy in delivering spring warmth up north, but this wonderful pie is my virtual ticket to the sunshine state and the golden state. For this shivering northern girl, it's a sure cure for the springtime doldrums.
Pistachio Graham Cracker Crust:
3/4 cups chopped pistachios
2 tablespoons firmly packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons graham cracker crumbs
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Big pinch of salt
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly butter a 9 1/2 inch pie pan and set aside. Combine the nuts, brown sugar, and flour in a food processor and process in a number of long bursts until the nuts are very finely chopped. Dump the mixture into a large bowl. Run your fingers through them, breaking up any bigger pieces the machine might have missed. Stir in the graham cracker crumbs, cinnamon, and salt. Add the butter and incorporate well. Mix first with a fork, then with your hands, and rub everything together thoroughly to form evenly dampened crumbs.
Spread the crumbs evenly and loosely in the pie pan, pressing them into the bottom and up the side. Refrigerate for 10 minutes. Place on the center oven rack and bake for 7 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack.
Filling:
2 cups fresh orange juice (or use a not-from-concentrate brand such as Tropicana)
2 cups (about 1 1/2 14-ounce cans) sweetened condensed milk
5 large egg yolks
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons grated orange zest (optional)
Garnish:
1 cup heavy whipping cream, whipped
Threads of orange zest
Bring the orange juice to a rapid boil in a medium saucepan. Continue to boil until reduced to about 2/3 cup; keep a heatproof measuring cup nearby to check. Pour into a shallow bowl and let cool briefly. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Combine the condensed milk, egg yolks, lime juice, vanilla, and orange zest in a large bowl, whisking well to combine. Whisk in the reduced orange juice until evenly blended. Pour the filling into the cooled pie shell.
Place the pie on the center oven rack and bake for 20 minutes. Even if the filling does not appear solid, remove the pie from the oven; the filling will firm up as the pie cools. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool thoroughly. Cover with loosely tented aluminum foil and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, preferably longer. Pipe the whipped cream decoratively over the pie, or simply smooth it over the top. Garnish with the orange zest, if desired, using a lemon zester or sharp vegetable peeler to peel off long threads. Slice and serve.
If almonds you adore, Amaretto-Amaretti pie you will amore. This recipe is another from pie master Ken Haedrich, but I've taken some creative license with it since I'm nuts about almonds. Each component of the pie is based on my favorite nut. The crust begins with amaretti which are dry Italian cookies found at most large supermarkets. If you can't locate amaretti, you can substitute plain biscotti. The pie filling and the whipped cream topping are laced with amaretto, a sweet Italian almond flavored liqueur. For an elegant presentation, I garnish the pie with chocolate dipped almonds.
The pie is more like a flourless chocolate torte. The nearly indiscernible crust melds lusciously into the dense chocolate filling. The light whipped topping perfectly complements the pie's rich flavor and deep color. I would serve this dessert as the grand finale to a romantic dinner. Break out your finest crystal and silver. Light some candles and play some Dean Martin love songs as mood music. With Dino crooning in the background, you'll be swooning over this decadent treat. When the moon hits your eye like a big amaretto pie, that's amore!
Amaretti Crumb Crust:
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
1/4 cup ground almonds (I grind them in a coffee mill)
1 1/4 cups amaretti crumbs (can substitute biscotti crumbs)
2 tablespoons sugar
Combine butter and chocolate in a small saucepan over low heat, stirring until melted. Cool to room temperature. Meanwhile, combine the ground almonds, amaretti crumbs and sugar in a medium bowl. Add the chocolate mixture and stir well. Transfer the crumb blend to 9 1/2-inch deep dish pie pan, pressing it into the bottom and up the side. Refrigerate for 10 minutes.
Filling:
1/2 cup unsalted butter, cut into pieces
3 ounces unsweetened chocolate
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/4 cup heavy or whipping cream
2 tablespoons amaretto
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Garnish:
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon amaretto (can substitute almond extract)
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate
16-20 whole almonds
Place the butter and chocolate in small saucepan over low heat. Stir constantly until melted. Remove from heat and cool. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a large bowl, beat the sugar, eggs, and salt with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until the mixture is thick, pale yellow, and foamy, about 4 minutes. Beat in the corn syrup, heavy cream, amaretto, vanilla and chocolate mixture until evenly blended. Pour the filling into the chilled pie shell.
Place the pie on the center oven rack and bake until it has puffed considerably around the edge and slightly less in the center, about 50 minutes. Rotate the pie 180 degrees halfway through the baking, so that the part that faced the back of the oven now faces forward. When done, the filling will be wobbly but not soupy in the center.
Transfer the pie to a wire rack and let cool. Meanwhile, melt the chocolate in a small saucepan. Dip the almonds halfway in the melted chocolate and place on a wax paper lined cookie sheet. Refrigerate for 10-15 minutes to harden chocolate. Whip the heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add amaretto and continue to whip until stiff peaks form. Pipe or spread whipped cream onto cooled pie. Garnish with chocolate-dipped almonds. This pie can be served warm or at room temperature.
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum! I finish out my spirited pie theme with a rum infused coconut pie. Bursting with Caribbean flavors and a delicious coconut crust this pie is sure to turn the surliest pirate into a sappy pie-rate! The recipe calls for dark rum which differs from golden and light rum. Dark rum retains some of the residual molasses used in the distillation process and its deep flavor with hints of spice are best for this pie. I recommend Myers's rum not because Myers is my maiden and I might be distantly related to the founder of one of the most famous rum distilleries in the world, but because Myers Rum Company uses only pure Jamaican molasses and its quality is unparalleled. Arrr!
This pie can be made a week ahead and kept frozen until serving time. Make sure to add the pineapple slices and toasted coconut garnish just before serving. The pie's tropical flavor is reminiscent of a piña colada. It would be a perfect accompaniment to a luau, a Caribbean theme gathering, and dare I say a swashbucklin' pirate bash!
So ahoy, mateys! Tote this pie to your next grog fest. All yer hearties and scallywags alike will take a shine to your fine grub! Arrrgh!
Crust:
1 1/4 cup packed sweetened flaked coconut (reserve 1/4 cup for garnish)
1 1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1 large egg white
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spread coconut onto cookie sheet and toast for about 10 minutes until golden brown, stirring every few minutes to prevent burning. Set aside 1/4 cup for garnish. In small bowl mix coconut with graham cracker crumbs, butter and egg white. Press mixture into a 9 1/2 inch pie pan. Freeze 10 minutes. Bake crust until golden brown, about 10 minutes. Cool. Place in freezer.
Filling:
1 (15 ounce) can cream of coconut (such as Coco Lopez) well blended
6 large egg yolks
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 cups chilled heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon coconut extract
3 tablespoons dark rum (you can substitute 2 teaspoons of rum extract)
1 (16 ounce) can pineapple rings, drained
1/4 cup apricot preserves, stirred to soften
Whisk 1 cup cream of coconut, egg yolks, and lime juice in large metal saucepan. On medium low heat, whisk mixture continuously until candy thermometer registers 165 degrees, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in rum. Using electric mixer, beat mixture until cool and thick, about 5 minutes.
Whip heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add extract and remaining cream of coconut and whip until stiff peaks form. Fold cream mixture into egg mixture. Freeze until softly set, stirring occasionally, about 2 hours.
Spoon filling into crust, mounding slightly. Cover and freeze overnight. (Can be prepared 1 week ahead. Keep frozen).
When ready to serve, run a small knife around sides of pan. Arrange pineapple on top of pie in overlapping circles. Brush with preserves. Sprinkle with 1/4 cup toasted coconut.
