This is pretty easy to make but somewhat time consuming. You could use a pre-made frozen pie crust to save time.
I baked and mixed the filling ingredients and made the pie crust dough the day before and then did all of the baking the next day.
Makes 1 9-10 inch pie
Ingredients
Pie Crust (or buy a pre-made frozen crust)
500 g all-purpose flour
¼ tsp salt (leave out if using salted butter)
250 g unsalted butter
120 ml ice cold water
Butternut Squash Preparation
600 g butternut squash (peeled, de-seeded, and cut into 1cm pieces)
3 Tbsp olive oil
½ tsp ground coriander or cumin
1 tsp finely chopped fresh rosemary
1 ½ Tbsp honey (if solid, warm so it can be mixed easily)
Spinach Preparation
200 g baby spinach leaves
10 g salted butter
Blue Cheese Mixture
175 g blue cheese or 175 g goat's cheese
2 Tbsp sour cream (or crème fraîche)
¼ tsp salt (adjust to taste), if using goat's cheese start with ½ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper (adjust to taste)
Tools
9-10 inch pie pan or straight sided pan
Baking parchment
Baking sheet
Roasting pan
Largish mixing bowl
Medium to large saucepan
Colander
Method
Pie Crust
Cut the butter into 1 cm pieces and cut or rub into the flour. If you have a food processor or stand mixer use them to cut the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. If not, use your hands to rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
Slowly mix in the ice cold water until the dough just comes together, you likely will not use all of the water.
Form the dough into a ball, press into a thick disc, wrap in parchment paper and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
If using a pre-made crust, move it from the freezer to the fridge at this point.
After 2 hours (or the next day):
Preheat the oven to 400F
Roll the dough out thinly on a piece of parchment paper. Line the pie tin with the dough, letting some dough hang over the edge of of the tin.
Put the pie tin on a baking sheet (to keep the dough from falling off into your oven), cover the edge of the crust with foil or a pie protector, and bake for 10-15 minutes or until the base is golden.
Prick the bottom of the crust with a fork right when it comes out of the oven to help it lie flat and cut off any extra dough hanging off the edge of the pie tin. Use a sharp knife and work carefully or you might tear a larger piece off than you mean to.
Set aside to cool. Bring the left over dough into a disc, wrap in parchment, and put the the refrigerator to chill.
Butternut Squash Mixture
Preheat the oven to 400F and line the roasting pan with baking parchment.
Peel and de-seed the squash. Weigh out 600g and set the rest aside. Cube the 600 g of squash into 1 cm pieces and put into a mixing bowl. Set aside.
Mix the oil, coriander (or cumin), rosemary and honey together and pour over the squash.
Stir the squash until well covered by the oil mixture.
Pour the squash mixture into the roasting pan and spread the squash out so it is only one layer deep.
Bake in the oven for 20-25 minutes until just tender. Don't over bake as the squash will be baked a 2nd time in the pie.
Spinach Mixture
While the squash is cooking, melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat.
Rinse the spinach
Add the spinach to the butter and cook down until all of the spinach is wilted and very dark green.
Move the spinach to a colander and squeeze as much of the liquid out as you can. You can also roll the spinach in several pieces of paper towel and squeeze out over the sink. The more thorough you are with this step the better the pie will turn out.
Leave in the colander to to continue to drain.
Blue Cheese Mixture
Crumble the blue cheese into a mixing bowl, stir in the sour cream and the salt and pepper to taste (taste as you go as the cheese can be different batch to batch).
Final Filling Steps
Preheat the oven to 180C/160Fan/350F/Gas4
Add the spinach to the Blue Cheese mixture and stir until well combined. Add the butternut squash and mix until the squash is evenly distributed.
Roll out the remaining pie dough and make strips for the lattice and edging.
Fill the cooled pie crust with the filling, use the strips of pie dough to make a lattice across the top and around the edge.
Optional: For a shinier finish, beat an egg and brush the across the edge of the crust and the lattice.
Bake for 35-65 minutes. After 30 min start checking every 5-10 minutes. If the crust edge starts to brown to quickly, cover with foil or pie protector. As the pie cooks, look for the filling to start to dry out (if liquid is still actively bubbling up keep baking) and the lattice to brown.
When baked, remove from the oven and let cool for 10-15 minutes before serving.
Can be served warm or cold and will firm up more as it cools.
Store in the refrigerator.
Inspired by: Sophie's Four Seasons Individual Pies
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| Butternut squash, spinach, cheese pie with homemade pie crust in a cake pan. |
