Perfect Coconut Cream Pie Recipe

My classic coconut cream pie recipe is a hit every time! Brimming with coconut flavor from toasted coconut and coconut milk, this pie is perfect in every way. From the buttery, crisp crust to the thick, custardy filling to the fluffy whipped topping, it will be a hit at your next gathering. I recently re-tested the recipe and adjusted the ratio of coconut milk and cornstarch for a perfectly set, creamy custard filling. Just follow my step-by-step instructions for a no-fail coconut cream pie every time! This is one of my FAVORITE Flavors so you know I went all out to do it justice.

RECIPE: https://preppykitchen.com/coconut-cream-pie/

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Hey, I’m John Canel and today on Preppy Kitchen, we’re making a dreamy, delicious coconut cream pie. So, let’s get started. First off, the crust. We want a beautiful crisp butter crust to hold our creamy pie. I whipped up a batch of my favorite pie dough recipe from the blog. You can click up here for the video on how to make it, but this is a simple butter crust that’s been chilled. Flour your surface, flour the disc, and flour your rolling pin. We’re going to roll this out into a nice 13-in circle. Add more flour as needed. You should always be able to move your pie dough around. It should not get stuck. And you can see I’m using a pastry mat, which is a silicone sheet that nothing sticks to. And it’s a lovely insurance policy. If things got a little bit melty, I could just lift the whole thing up and pop it into the fridge. Your pi dough has to be chilled. But if it’s too cold, like straight out of the refrigerator, it’ll crack as you try to roll it out. So, let it warm up on the counter for at least 5 minutes until you can roll it without crazy cracks forming. If cracks do form, pinch the dough together, let it sit for a minute or two, and then continue rolling. [Music] If you’re using a store-bought pie crust, the steps will be a bit different. Of course, you can skip rolling it out and forming. And when we bake the empty pie crust to get that beautiful crisp shell, follow the instructions on the storebought pie crust because they bake up very differently. This looks like a lovely 13in circle. Let’s gather it up and pop this into our 9-in pie tin. You can see I’m using a metal pyon and not a glass one. Metal just works better. Center it up. And you want to push the pi dough towards the middle, not stretching it out. If there was any like massive excess, you could trim that, but this looks totally fine. So now we’re just going to fold it. And then we can crimp. Coconut cream pie is one of my favorite pies. I love the creamy like beautiful filling and the way it pairs so nicely with a crisp golden butter crust. And coconut is one of my favorite flavors. The pie topped the mountain of whipped cream can’t be beat. Most people only know about coconut cream pies from like the gag of someone getting a pie to the face. Sad. Once this is all folded over, we can crimp our pie crust however you’d like. doing the oldfashioned way with my thumb and then thumb and index finger, but if you wanted to, you could use a fork. You could be very fancy. It’s totally up to you. By the way, if you like my videos, hit that subscribe button. There’s two new recipes every single week and shorts, too. Okay, my pie shell is formed. But if you popped this into the oven now, it would just melt into a puddle and you’d be very sad. We need to chill this so it is nice and firm and will hold its shape when we bake it empty. Pop this into the fridge for at least an hour or you could freeze it for 30 minutes until it’s nice and firm. In you go. Towards the end of your chill time, preheat your oven to 425 so it is nice and hot. Do you want a really hot oven for blind baking? Pull your crust out of the freezer. And you can hear it is quite chilled. You’re going to grab a round of parchment paper and place that right in the middle. And this is a barrier because we need to support the pie crust as it bakes. Even as it is right now, it would still partially collapse if we just baked it. So, I’m going to grab a long length of foil and fold it onto itself. So, I’m creating more thickness. One, two, and three. Let’s fold it more. This gets placed in the center of my pie and pressed in. [Applause] Okay. So, you really want to press against the side of your pie dish cuz that’s the support. That’s where the area of weaknesses and that’s where sinking will happen. Because this is chilled or frozen, you can really press into the pie without disturbing the dough. Okay, we’re going to fill this up with dried beans or pie weights if you have them. Little bits of air trapped in the pie crust will cause it to bubble up and be unusable. So, you want to have it pressed down. And for that, we need some weight. Okay, we’re going to pop this into the oven now for 25 for 15 to 25 minutes or until the edges are golden brown. And you can rotate this if your oven has any hot spots. In you go. While your pie is baking, grab an egg and a tablespoon of cream. And we’re going to whip this up into an easy egg wash. Just give it a good mix and set that aside so it’s ready to brush on once our pie comes out of the oven. This baked up so nicely. Now, we’re going to carefully remove the foil and the paper and the weights. And you can see the edge is coming along. It looks nicely dried, very raw on the inside. So, we’re going to prick this about 12 times or so. We’re basically creating holes that steam can escape through cuz we don’t want this bubbling up now. And when I say bubbling up, I mean one giant pastry bubble. That’s not what you want. Brush all over with your egg wash. The egg wash does a couple of things. It makes your pie shiny and golden, but it’s important on the inside, too, because it provides a little bit of a moisture barrier so that luscious coconut cream pie filling doesn’t make your crisp butter crust soggy. Once it’s fully brushed, we can pop this back into the oven. However, the edge of our pie that was exposed is very close to being done, the center is like totally raw, and we need this to be crisp and golden throughout. So, you have two choices. If you’re a pie maker, you probably have one of these. It’s a pie tent. It’s so handy. You just wrap it around the edge of your pie and it protects it from burning. If you don’t have one of those, grab a long length of foil, fold it in half, and then wrap that loosely around your pie, and just fold it in. This does the exact same thing. And you can reuse this foil as well as the foil for tenting your pie multiple times so you don’t have to waste foil. We’re going to pop this back into the oven for 10 to 15 more minutes until the crust is golden all over. Keep an eye on it. You can rotate it too because every oven has a hot spot and you want this to be golden throughout, not burnt in one spot. In you go. My pie shells out of the oven and cooling. And I want to toast some coconut for this because it’s part of the recipe. And you can’t buy toasted coconut that I think I don’t think. For this recipe, you’re going to use the sweetened flaked coconut. It’s the kind that’s delicious to snack on. And you want about one and a3 cups for the filling, plus more for the top. The kids and I love having this mixed into our yogurt, too. So, I’m toasting additional. Spread it out onto the baking sheet in a nice thin layer. And you’re going to toast this at 325 for about 15 minutes, stirring every 3 to 5 because the edge will be burnt to a crisp if you just leave it there. You have to really make sure you’re mixing it up. Pop that into the oven and we can move on. The heart of this pie is a creamy coconut custard. So, we’re going to start off with two whole eggs and two egg yolks. Two. You can save the whites for later. They freeze well, too. [Music] Give this a nice whisk. Coconut’s a fairly exotic flavor. So, this pie became popular in the early 1900s when coconut became more readily available. And there was a processing plant in Philadelphia that made it even more available. We’re going to set this aside now and grab a small saucepan. In this small saucepan, we’re going to combine 1 and 1/2 cups of half and half or whole milk with an equal amount, 1 and 1/2 cups of coconut milk. Coconut milk is just really lumpy. Most of the time you open up a can and the top is solid coconut fat, which is delicious, and the bottom is like water. So, for this recipe, we need it nice and smooth. So, we’re going to add this lumpy mess in. And we’re going to warm this up over medium heat, just stirring occasionally until it’s warm and the solids have all been broken up. Onto the stove you go. While that’s heating up, grab a medium pot. And we’re going to combine our sugar and cornstarch. 1 cup or 200 g of granulated sugar. Then 5 tablespoons or 40 g of cornstarch. And a little 1/4 teaspoon of salt just for some contrast. My scale did its job. And I grab a whisk and we’re just going to mix this up. I’m using a narrow whisk because this is what I’ll be using for my custard and I want it to be able to get into the corner of my pot. Just helps me make sure that nothing burns. This is like an area of problems if you’re using a wide or balloon whisk. Give this a nice mix. And that’s all ready because I think my milk mixture is nice and warm. The lumps are all gone. I’m going to take this off heat now. And we’re going to pour this into our sugar mixture while whisking. My sugar and cornstarch milk solution is warm, but we’re going to take it over medium heat, whisking constantly until it starts to bubble and it’s thickened and it’ll coat the back of a spoon. This is a nice test, so just have a wooden spoon handy. Onto the heat you go. [Music] So, this pie is going to be so good. I just want to explain why. The crisp butter crust, if you’ve ever had a pie from a store, it’s not a crisp butter crust. Even if it was to begin with, it’s probably now a stale, slightly soggy crust because it’s just been hanging out for a while. Part of the joy of this recipe is the contrast of that flaky butter crust with that smooth creamy filling that has the toasted coconut and the light mountain of whipped cream on top. These are all the things that’ll bring joy to your palette with every bite. We’re not using any fake flavors like coconut extract, so it just tastes so fresh and real and lovely. For this step, you just want to make sure that you’re stirring. And I like to start on the edge of the pot, move in, and go back to the edge. This just ensures that I’m not going to get any scalded milk that kind of congeals. It’s starting to thicken up and bubble. So, I’m going to show you what it looks like on the spoon. Dip that in. Look at that coating. It’s so nice. Take it off heat. It’s time to temper the eggs. If I just poured this in, they would It’s too hot. They’d probably scramble. So, grab about a cup of your milk. You’re going to whisk vigorously while drizzling this in. This will warm the eggs up, let them mix in nicely, but not cook and scramble. You want to have that silky texture. Okay, whisked in nicely. So, now we’re going to combine the eggs into our milk. Just keep on stirring. And now we have a silky smooth mixture with no scrambled eggs. We’re going to take this back onto heat one last time for 2 to 3 minutes at medium. Keep stirring. And you’ll notice that this thickens and the whisk will leave a trail. But I’ll show you what that looks like. We need to cook the eggs and just finish thickening this up. At this point, I want to keep stirring, but I’m not whisking vigorously. I just want to keep it moving. I’m not trying to pump a lot of air into here. I just want to make sure that nothing’s burning on the bottom of my pot. So, you can also kind of trace the side and just make sure nothing’s sticking. In the custard, we have two things working together to thicken things up. Actually, three. We have the cornstarch, which is great. the eggs, which will give us more of that connection. And finally, we’re going to add a little butter at the end, which is really just for richness in the like how it feels on your palette, but it also gives you a little bit more stability. After just a few minutes, this is beginning to bubble a little bit. And my whisk is leaving a trail when I swoop it through. You can come take a look at what that looks like, but this lets me know my mixture is done. Take that off heat and bring it back to your countertop. Well, you don’t have to actually, but I am. And now for the finishing touch. If you taste this right now, it’s delicious. But when we add a/4 cup or 57 g of cubed butter in, it’s going to do two things. Help it cool down, but also introduce a lovely richness. You’ll just taste the difference. It will dissolve on your tongue in a beautiful way. Let’s add that in. And now we’re going to whisk this until the butter is totally dissolved. Oh my gosh, the smell is so beautiful. I love it. Almost done. Right now, we have a lovely somewhat subtle coconut flavor in this custard. We are gonna amp it up with some toasted coconut. My coconut toasted beautifully. Let’s grab a cup and a third. I have more for snacking and garnish. I’ve already been like totally losing control and just eating it by the handful. We’re going to add this into our coconut mixture now. And give it a good stir. Fold that in so everything’s nicely distributed. And now you’ll allow this to cool for 10 minutes before we pour it into our pie shell. We just don’t want to have a boiling hot mixture added in there because it’ll kind of seep in and change the consistency. Smells so good. After about 10 minutes, it’s time to pour your slightly cooled filling into your pie shell. Did I show you this pie shell? So pretty and golden. Off camera, when this is time to give it a check, there was a giant bubble. This is happens because you docked the pie shell. Yes, but the egg wash will fill in the holes. My suggestion is you check it kind of regularly. If you see a big bubble forming, grab a small knife, give it some real pokes, and then press it in using the bottom of a measuring cup. That’s what I did, and it leveled out nicely. Don’t leave your pie shell in the oven and come and check it when it’s done because nine times out of 10 there’s some kind of a bubble forming and you do need to press it down while it’s still hot and malleable. Also, if you care about the aesthetics of the inside that nobody sees and you notice a little hot spot forming, which always does where it’s darker than the rest, just grab a little piece of tin foil, cover that up, and continue baking. That’s for the VOS out there. All right, let’s get this filled up. fill that pie shell up. [Music] You can give it a little smooth if it’s kind of extra lumpy or there’s a mound. You’ll probably have noticed that when this was hot, it was pretty liquidy. As it cools down, it really starts to set up nicely. This needs 6 hours in the fridge to finish setting. You don’t want to cut into this and it falls apart because it’s too runny. So, into the fridge we go. six hours to overnight. I usually like to just make this the day ahead so that I know it’s done, but if you started early, you can enjoy it in the evening. Once your pie is all chilled, it’s time to whip up some cream. Two cups cold, heavy cream. And if you have trouble with whipped cream, it sounds silly because it’s so simple, but some brands are just not conducive to it for whatever reason. And then I will say you can chill the bowl, chill your whisk, and have everything just ice cold and ready. 1/4 cup of powdered sugar, just about 30 g, and 2 tsps of vanilla. We’re going to mix this up. Start on low and go all the way up to high. You want soft peaks to form. It’s about 2 minutes. But the other thing I’ll tell you is if you’re having trouble whipping cream, I always suggest that you stop whipping before the cream is ready. Then just finish it up by hand. It’ll be perfect every time. [Music] [Applause] All right, it’s nearly done. I have beautiful, very, very soft peaks forming. You can finish it off by hand now. Almost lovely. Perfectly stiff peaks, but still so luscious. Gather ye whipped cream up. And now we’re going to plop that on top. Oh, the decadence. I love how whipped cream is just something that seems light and refreshing even though it’s quite rich and indulgent. Like a chocolate cake with whipped cream frosting. Yes. Use your spatula to swoop to your heart’s content. And if you wanted to, you could just eat the pie without whipped cream or with little dollops. You can make a tiny batch of it. But that’s not my version of this pie. Your pie will last up to 4 days in the refrigerator. Or you could freeze it for 2 months without the whipped cream topping. Just wrap it really well and then thaw overnight in the refrigerator. You can finish this off with a sprinkle of toasted coconut, topped with a mountain of whipped cream, and sprinkled with coconut shavings on top. My coconut cream pie is ready for a cut. And just like that, it’s ready to enjoy. That is a dreamy, creamy, amazing coconut recipe. The combination of that light layer of whipped cream with that coconut custard filled with the toasted coconut in a crisp butter crust just cannot be beat. I hope you get a chance to make this amazing recipe. And if you like my videos, hit that subscribe button and check out my pie