Pie Club Week 2: Coconut Cream

Week 2 was Coconut Cream, and this week I only made one recipe version. Most people have had coconut cream pie before, so I knew what I wanted in this pie. The coconut cream I made had coconut custard on the bottom, and sweetened whipped cream on top of the custard. I made the custard with coconut milk, whole milk, sugar, egg yolks, salt and cornstarch and then folded in toasted coconut flakes. I also topped the pie with toasted coconut flakes. I used my pate brisee recipe for the crust.

Overall, the pie was very delicious and I only received very positive feed back about his pie, including "I would definatley purchase this pie in a bake shop" and "This is the best coconut cream pie I have ever had". I really enjoyed making and eating this pie! It was perfectly smooth, creamy and light. The custard had a very pleasing mouth feel, and smelled amazing! Since I toasted the coconut, it had a very nice texture and did not stick in my teeth like coconut sometimes will. It held shape perfectly and was visually appealing.

The only thing I will work on to improve upon this coconut cream is that I would like there to be more coconut flavor in the custard. I used vanilla with the coconut milk, but I think I will take that out of the recipe. Also, I would like to infuse some coconut flavor into the custard through a steeping process, or something similar, to get more true coconut flavor. I try to use extracts, especially with a flavor like coconut. I am excited to experiment!