Petra Cox: I am Petra Cox with Moms Apple Company Pie in Occoquan, Virginia and now that weve made our bottom crust for our pumpkin pie, were going to make a pumpkin pie filling to put in it. So what we need for that is our eggs, weve two of those. I am going to crack in to a mixer and beat them just until the yolks are broken. I like to use the whisk function in a mixer, just because it makes really quick work of mixing. There are so many points where all the ingredients are being integrated. So, next I am going to add half a cup of sugar, mix that just until the sugar and the eggs are just combined. We have used only a half cup of sugar, some recipes use more in a pumpkin pie but since we use our own nice fresh pumpkins that we go ourselves, we sort of really rely on the flavor of the pumpkin to make the pie really good. So, I have a cup and a quarter here of pumpkin and squash mix, of course we are using the fresh stuff. If you are using canned pumpkin, you might want to add a just a little bit of water for moisture because fresh pumpkin is sometimes a little more watery, a little more juicy than the canned pumpkin.

So, on to our egg sugar and pumpkin and squash mixture, I am going to add our dry spices which are the cinnamon. We got a tea spoon and a half of cinnamon, a half a tea spoon ginger, half a tea spoon of nut meg and a quarter of a tea spoon of cloves. Cloves are probably the most potent spices, so we need a little less of that than the other things. Cinnamon is the sort of sweeter spice here so we add a little more and cinnamon is sort of the flavor that you expect in a pumpkin pie, so theres more of that than the other spices. The spices also have to get pumpkin pie sort of deeper color, so, we mix that just to combine. So, one ingredient that you dont think of, when you think of pumpkin pie is salt. It doesnt taste salty when you eat it but it sort of around that, all the other flavors in the pumpkin pie, the sweetness and spiciness and flavoredness. So, we put just half a teaspoon of salt and then we move on to the liquid ingredients. And then the last and final ingredient for the most basic pumpkin pie is your dairy. We use three quarters cup of regular condensed milk not skimmed condensed. That means the half of the water has been removed from the milk so you get a lot of nice dairy flavor without as much liquid and theres also a quarter cup of heavy cream so you get the nice sort of rich flavor from that as well. If youre using canned pumpkin, you can use a little more of the milk mixture or you can use a little water to add some more moisture to it and so we add this in to that mix. Pumpkin pie filling can be made ahead of time and put in the refrigerator but if you do that you would probably like to add the eggs last, just so that it keeps better. Now, that I have put all the ingredients in here, I am going to scrape up the edges, make sure that every thing is really nicely combined. So, after Ive scooped down that sides, Im going to give it a quick mix again. And now, we have made our pumpkin pie filling for a pumpkin pie. At this point you can pour it straight in to the pie crust and bake it for about 45 minutes to an hour in the 350 degree oven or you can add some other additions to make a more unique pumpkin pie. So Ill show you how to do that right now.