Pumpkin pie

[cjsmith]

I'm experimenting with sugar levels. The recipe I have used for decades is a bit oversweet, so as a first step, just now I made one pie with half the sugar my recipe calls for. I didn't add or subtract anything else. I wanted to see what this would do.

I will never add the "normal" amount of sugar again! WOOHOO!

The sugar decrease changes the texture a little, but not so much that I care. Next time around I also think I'll crank up the cinnamon, ginger, and clove, to give the tongue a little extra treat to play with in the absence of facepounding sweetness. But just as it is I find it scrumptious.

Now that I've seen how "half" comes out, I need to think on what to tweak to get a good no-sugar pie. That seems to me to be the most flexible option. People wanting a low sugar intake can have such a pie as is, people going for a high sugar intake can sprinkle powdered sugar on top or load up on the sweetened whipped cream, and those who are flexible can go either way as the mood strikes them.

I have enough supplies for one more this afternoon. I'm musing on what to tweak for the texture. I know if I do nothing, it won't congeal as much as it needs to. Hmmm...

Comments

[allanh.livejournal.com]

You might want to experiement with Stevia, a natural sweetener which is available at most health food or vitamin stores (and Whole Foods, of course). It's much sweeter than sugar, so you may need something (I like the earlier suggestion of unflavored gelatin) to bulk up the texture a little bit.

Stevia has calories, but is so much sweeter than sugar, the calories are pretty minimal ... and so is the blood sugar impact.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I think if I'm going to make it sweet anyway, I'll just go ahead and use sugar. As I mentioned to just_cyd above, I need to decide what my goal is with the no-sugar-added pie. Do I want to feed it to a diabetic friend (or to my athletic sister and brother-in-law, who both stay away from sweets)? Or do I want to feed it to people (including me, I hope) who enjoy a variety of things without necessarily making them taste sweet?