Sweet Potato Honey Beer Pie
Nik Sharma · The Flavor Equation
Sweet potatoes are on a monthly rotation in my household; even my dog, Snoopy, loved them. The different components of the pie can be prepared on different days. Here's a suggested order of steps you might find useful, especially if you make this for Thanksgiving. Day 1: Roast sweet potatoes, reduce the beer, and prepare the pie crust, but don't blind bake (partially bake). Day 2: Blind bake the pie crust, prepare the sweet potato custard, and bake the pie. Of course, you can also do this all in one day.
The Flavour Approach:
Heat plays a very important part in this recipe: The bitterness of beer is concentrated through reduction by evaporating the water. When the nuts in the crust are heated, a whole new set of flavour molecules is produced, which will vary depending on the type of nut used. Heat also helps the egg, nuts, and sugar bind together to form the structure of the pie.
When sweet potatoes are heated, the enzyme amylase breaks down the starch stored in the vegetable’s cell
