MMMMM----- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v8.06
 
      Title: Eric's Chocolate Pecan Pie
 Categories: Pastry, Pies, Nuts, Chocolate
      Yield: 6 servings
 
      4 tb Butter
    1/2 c  Dark brown sugar
      1 lg Egg
    1/2 c  100% pure maple syrup
      6 oz Pecans broken up by hand
      6 oz Semi-sweet chocolate.
      1    (10") frozen pie crust
 
  Eric's recipe made two to three pies, so the first thing
  I needed to do was effectively halve the recipe.
  
  Eric uses Ghirardelli's Double Chocolate chips in his
  recipe and warns against the use of milk chocolate.
  (Double Chocolate is Ghirardelli's branding for
  bittersweet chocolate for baking.) I was picking up the
  necessary ingredients at my local supermarket (Save
  Mart) on the way home from work and was surprised to
  find that they do not carry bittersweet chocolate chips
  at all. I picked up a bag of Guittard's Semi-Sweet
  Baking Chips and thus deviated from Eric's recipe a
  little (or maybe a lot).
  
  First, I creamed the butter and brown sugar together.
  
  Then I added an egg and mixed until it was fully
  integrated.
  
  I scraped the bowl down once and added maple syrup. A
  few more seconds and my Kitchenaid stand mixer had the
  mixture smooth and consistent.
  
  After removing the bowl from the mixer, I poured in the
  halved pecans and stirred by hand with a spatula. Then I
  added the chocolate chips and stirred and folded until
  the pecans and chips were evenly dispersed, about ten
  strokes.
  
  The mixture is then poured into the pie crust and
  leveled. Normally, I would blind bake the crust to
  ensure that it doesn't get soggy. (Blind baking is where
  you bake the crust without filling to harden the crust.
  This gives the crust more structural support to handle a
  wet filling so it doesn't fall apart or soak up too much
  liquid before the filling is baked.) Eric's recipe
  didn't mention this and called for a fairly high heat of
  375 F/190 C so I did not blind bake the crust.
  375 F/190 C until the filling set. I checked the
  filling by holding the pie on both sides and twisting
  gently to spin the pie pan. A set filling should not
  move on the outside and jiggle on the inside (like
  Jell-O). The pie was done after 45 minutes (just like
  Eric said).
  
  TASTE RESULTS: The pie is not your traditional pecan
  pie. This pie is quite chocolatey and less sweet than
  pecan pies that I've had from bakeries (which I felt was
  overwhelmingly sweet). I brought the pie into work and
  it was gone before I knew it with people asking for
  seconds (but there was none to give out). So, maybe
  Eric's original recipe of two or three pies would have
  been better.
  
  The general concensus was that the pie was very good and
  a welcome departure from the traditional pecan pie. The
  chocolate lover's especially liked the chocolate chips
  and some commented on the excellent flavor that the
  maple syrup introduced. I recommend trying this recipe!
  
  RECIPE FROM: http://www.cookingforengineers.com
  
  Uncle Dirty Dave's Archives
 
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