OT: For Thanksgiving - An Okinawan Twist on Sweet Potato Pie

JohnInCarolina

My Nana used to make these amazing sweet potato pies for Thanksgiving.  She would use white sweet potatoes, and the consistency of the pie is much closer to custard or pumpkin pie than anything else you might expect.  After she passed many many years ago, the tradition was picked up by my mother and to some extent my wife of late.

I'm used to making the Thanksgiving turkey on my BGE, and we normally have all of my graduate students and a bunch of family and friends over for dinner at our place.  Obviously we can't do that this year, and we're headed to a family's house here at one of the military bases for Thanksgiving.  So it will be very different this year, but I'm still very thankful.

Okinawa has purple sweet potatoes, called Beni Imo.  They actually make ice cream with it - it's pretty good.  I told my wife I thought it would be cool to make a sweet potato pie using them.  This was not a small request, as we don't have anywhere near our full suite of kitchen utensils here.  For example, my wife had to roll the pie crust with a wine bottle.  Anyway, she was game and here is one of them:

I'm happy to report that I have sampled one of the pies, and it tastes as amazing as it looks! 

Eggcelsior

Awesome! Your wife is a trooper.

theyolksonyou

Pretty damn cool.

DMW

Nice! I like the wine bottle rolling pin idea.

BizGreenEgg

That looks pretty great.  Love to try unique dishes.

NPHuskerFL

Dude! That's an colorful UmpaLumpa pie
Awesome family tradition you spoke of with your Grandmother, Mother and now wife (hopefully you can continue this for future generations). Love the fly by the seat of your pants ingenuity with your wife and the wine bottle rolling pin.
Fantastic looking pie (I'd eat that without a doubt). Thanks for sharing as always JIC.

Fred19Flintstone

That pie looks SUPER AMAZING!

dldawes1

I agree that unique cooks are very interesting....for me just the simple ones are interesting !!!!!

You folks amaze me at the different ideas you come up with....I am so glad to have found this forum and the concept of the Big Green Egg.

caliking

Now that's determination Love the color of the pie. what did your Japanese friends think of it?

JohnInCarolina

caliking said:

Now that's determination Love the color of the pie. what did your Japanese friends think of it?

We haven't had any Japanese people try it yet, and actually I kind of doubt there will be any at the Thanksgiving dinner we're attending. On the bases here, you might as well be somewhere in the middle of Florida.

stemc33

Magnificent. Too cool :-bd

Mama Roneck

very cool! 

CarolinaCrazy

That is beautiful. Glad the taste lived up to expectations!

SGH

That purple pie is beyond cool. Even if it would have tasted bad, it would have been worth making for the cool affect a lone. Awesome man =D>

JohnInCarolina

I'm bumping this as @SonVolt asked for the recipe for the regular one, which uses white sweet potatoes.  Here it is, courtesy of Mrs JIC:

2 lbs. white sweet potatoes

1 cup butter, softened

2 cups sugar

1 cup half & half

4 eggs

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teaspoons vanilla

1. Boil potatoes 40-50 minutes. Then run them under cold water to remove the skin.

2. Mix sweet potatoes with butter. (I think you cut the potatoes in chunks before this step.)

3. Stir in other ingredients.

4. Beat on medium with electric mixer until smooth

5. Pour into piecrust 

6. Bake at 350 degrees for 55-60 minutes

The wife believes this yields 3 pies.

caliking

Thanks for the recipe. I've been wanting to try this, as well.

Does the pie crust have to be blind baked for some time?

SonVolt

Awesome! thank you

JohnInCarolina

caliking said:

Thanks for the recipe. I've been wanting to try this, as well.

Does the pie crust have to be blind baked for some time?

Unfortunately I don't have any info on the crust.  All I know is that my Nana made them from scratch.  

SaltySam

Having been to Okinawa and having their purple sweet potatoes in just about everything, I can honestly say that I would LOVE to try this pie.  

JohnInCarolina

SaltySam said:

Having been to Okinawa and having their purple sweet potatoes in just about everything, I can honestly say that I would LOVE to try this pie.  

We got to enjoy the ice cream flavored with it.  But yeah this pie was pretty awesome back in the day.  

JohnInCarolina

Bump.

GrateEggspectations

Eggcelsior said:

Awesome! Your wife is a trooper.

And not only for putting up with John!