Sour Cream Raisin Pie

There are many variations to Sour Cream Raisin Pie. Some recipes include egg yolks or buttermilk, vanilla or lemon juice, nutmeg or cloves. The pies can be single crust, double crust or even topped with meringue.

I've tweaked a recipe that I found whilst doing a web search to come up with a simple version of the pie using ingredients that I already had in the store cupboard. I feel a bit uncomfortable about sharing the recipe that I found due to copyright reasons. I will tell you though that the recipe uses cinnamon and vinegar, eggs and ground allspice and of course sour cream and raisins. I substituted ingredients for dark brown soft sugar, mixed spice, malt vinegar and Californian seedless raisins.

I bought a packet of shortcrust pastry and used it to line a shallow fluted tin. The ingredients were mixed together and poured into the uncooked pastry case. The pie was baked in the oven at 180 degrees Celsius for 1 hour. It was as simple as that!

I ate a piece of the pie whilst it was still hot. It reminded me a bit of mincemeat tart or Christmas pudding flavours. I cut off another slice this morning, cold from the fridge and it was just as good, perhaps even better than when hot as the flavours seem more pronounced. I think it would be nice served with custard, cream or vanilla ice cream but I like to pour evaporated milk over pies and puddings!

I can see so much mileage in this recipe with its infinite variations. Some people soak the raisins to give them a plumpness other people may like to grind them as an old work colleague of mine used to do when making her Christmas cake. She said that when eating a fruit cake she didn't like meeting up with a whole raisin!

I think I might make a meringue topped one at Christmas to give it a seasonal snowy top! This is a quick, simple and satisfying dessert to make. The only downside is the clearing up!