Strawberry Pretzel Pie Recipe

A childhood favorite—grown up.

All of us have dishes from our childhood that we look once more on fondly—sometimes to the bafflement of those spherical us. For me, that dish is a Jell-O salad. For the uninitiated, Jell-O salads are an American conventional. Flavored gelatin is mixed with each little factor from canned fruit to frozen peas, whipped cream to cottage cheese, and toasted nuts to salty pretzels. The last word mix is poured into elaborate molds or layered into bars and served at family gatherings, trip occasions, and summer time season picnics as a principal, facet, or in actual fact, dessert.

One Jell-O salad significantly lingers in my memory: strawberry pretzel salad. Layers of salty pretzels, tangy cream cheese, and sweet strawberry Jell-O are combined into sliceable bars, that’s the dessert I sought out on the entire potluck tables.

For this pie, I wanted to handle the spirit of the strawberry pretzel salad nonetheless swap out the factitious strawberry style with juicy spring strawberries. The last word end result’s a buttery and salty pretzel crumb crust, full of every cooked and up to date strawberries and topped with an ethereal whipped cream cheese topping. Strawberry pretzel salad: all grown up.

A Celebration of Strawberries

Strawberries are a type of fruits that I wait all 12 months for. With a short rising window of late spring and early summer time season, I plan most of my spring baking spherical celebrating this favorite fruit.

On account of current spring strawberries are extraordinarily flavorful and juicy on their very personal, I want to have as many current berries in my pie as potential. For the filling, a small amount of the berries get mashed and shortly cooked with a bit little bit of cornstarch until merely thickened proper right into a jam which will preserve each little factor collectively, sooner than folding in heaps of sliced current berries.

I want to let the flavour of the current strawberries shine, so preserve the seasonings straightforward: sugar, lemon, and a bit little bit of orange zest. That being talked about, every batch of berries is considerably fully completely different, so I prefer to advocate tasting and adjusting your jam as a result of it cooks to steadiness out the sweetness of your explicit berries.

Whipped Cream Cheese Makes This Topping Explicit

As an alternative of layering sweetened cream cheese into my pie (as is accomplished throughout the distinctive salad inspiration), I want in order so as to add a lightweight and tangy whipped cream cheese topping.

The topping is easy to make and has the bonus of being further regular than conventional whipped cream.

Only a few points to recollect when making your whipped topping:

• Use room temperature cream cheese: Very like butter, cream cheese aerates larger when it’s softened at room temperature, resulting in a smoother and lighter topping.
• Use chilled cream: Conversely, cream aerates further merely when it’s chilly. Maintain your heavy cream throughout the fridge until you’re capable of whip.
• Go sluggish: If you’ve added the heavy cream, you should definitely flip your mixer velocity to sluggish and regulate what’s taking place. It’s easy to over whip when using {an electrical} mixer.

Know your peaks: We use the phrase “peaks” to elucidate how thick a mix is when it’s being whipped. For this topping I want to whip to a stiff peak—meaning it absolutely holds its kind as soon as I elevate my whisk out of the bowl.

Storing Strawberry Pretzel Pie

This pie is best served immediately after assembling, though it will preserve coated throughout the fridge for as a lot as 1 day—after that the crust will get a bit soggy.

If making ahead, I prefer to advocate storing the whipped topping in a separate airtight container and together with it to the pie correct sooner than you serve.

Further Strawberry Desserts to Make this Spring

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