Don't get me wrong, I loves me some fruit. Bursting berries, juicy pineapples, luscious mangos—all scrumptious treats. But for dessert, there's nothing as satisfying as something rich and chocolatey, crunchy and creamy. And man, this Chocolate Cream Pie(Saveur, Issue #126)fires on all cylinders.
I grew up eating the "semi-homemade" version of chocolate cream pie. My mom would boil up some My-T-Fine, pour it into a baked Oronoque crust from the freezer, chill it, and voilà! Chocolate cream pie! She'd serve it with a dollop of Cool Whip or a swirl of Reddi-Whip. Pardon me for a moment while I grab a barf bag.
This is the real thing, and we were lucky enough that Ben found the recipe and made it last weekend. He's currently taking a culinary course at school—the happy respite in his hectic "free-free" class schedule. (That'd be a schedule without any frees. Get it? "Free-free") Anyway, he's perpetually inspired to cook for the family on weekends, and has discovered the relaxing and therapeutic nature of cooking alone in the kitchen. (Now he understands why I often politely decline all the much-appreciated offers of help cooking.)
He tackled this himself from soup-to-nuts—from composing the shopping list to driving to the store and picking up the ingredients to preparing and garnishing the pie. The only thing he needed some guidance with was distinguishing the different sweetnesses of chocolate— semisweet, bitttersweet, and unsweetened can be a little tricky for the unfamiliar. When David and I came home from our evening out, this beautiful and delicious creation was awaiting. And after a night in the fridge, the pie was even better, of course, since the filling had a chance to set up. I managed to snag one very small piece before the whole pie was demolished in less than 48 hours by the pie-loving gentlemen of the house.
I can't possibly top the praise by a commenter on the Saveur website, who wrote; "If I hadn't made this myself, I would have sworn it was made with unicorn milk! The best chocolate dessert ever!" Ummmm, okay…