Vegan Pecan Pie

Let's start this off with a bit of fact: I don't enjoy pie. How can I say that, right? There are a million pies out there, and for me to make some blanket statement like that not only exposes my ignorance of the wonderful world of pies, but also makes my pie recipe post a bit confusing! Well then, let me be a bit more clear, when I say I don't ENJOY pie, it doesn't mean I DISLIKE pie. Get it? No? Here's the deal, I cannot eat pie (or any pastry for that matter) without an explosion of immediate guilt afterward. It's a sad little existence, but one which I have accepted! What's one piece of pie? Or one cupcake? Or a cookie here or there? And you're correct, it really wouldn't hurt to dabble a bit in sugary, mouth-watering euphoria...well...until the mental guilt hits. Besides, I'd rather faceplant into a bed of Goldfish, or any salty snack, anyway.

So why this recipe? It's for the most amazing man in existence (or at least my existence) - the Husband! He loves sugar, he loves sugar placed into warm, baked concoctions, and he absolutely adores pecan pie!

Here is my first attempt at veganizing a pecan pie recipe from House of Bakes - I also looked up a crust recipe and veganized that ol thang.

Recipe Deets

Crust (adapted from just about any simple crust recipe)
1/2 Pastry flour
1/2 Reg flour
1/4 cup Earth Balance butter
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Baking soda
1/4 cup Cold water

Filling
10 Saltine crackers (saw this little tip on a few of the recipes!)
1/2 cup Water
2 1/2 tbsp Earth Balance butter
1 1/4 cup Light brown sugar
1/4 cup Agave
2 tsp Vanilla extract
2 1/2 tbsp unsweetened applesauce (substituted for oil, so feel free to use oil instead)
3 1/2 tbsp Arrowroot (or cornstarch)

Pecan Top
1 cup pecan halves
1/2 tbsp Earth balance butter (just enough to cover the pecans)
1 tbsp Light brown sugar
a bit of salt

Preheat oven to 325

Crust—place pastry and all-purpose flour, butter, salt, and baking powder into a large bowl and blend (I used a hand blender, but a food processor would work too). Add water then blend into a dough ball thingy.

Sprinkle some flour on top of your counter and take dough ball and roll it out into a 1/4 inch thick sheet, then transfer to pie plate and trim the edges that are hanging off.  Prick across the bottom of the crust 5 or 6 times to aerate. Place in oven and bake for 5 minutes.

Pecan Topping—place pecan halves, butter, brown sugar and salt into a frying pan on medium heat. As soon as it starts to sizzle turn the heat down to medium-low and stir occasionally while working on the filling.

Filling—crumble crackers into a small mixing bowl and pour in water. Let cracker crumbs soak all the water up.

With a hand blender or food processor, place butter, brown sugar, agave, vanilla, applesauce , arrowroot, and crack mixture in bowl and mix until liquid. Pour into saucepan on medium heat and bring to a low boil, stirring constantly. When it comes to a boil, let cook for a couple-o-minutes. Pour into crust shell while still hot. Then put pecan halves on top (you can be all fancy-schmancy about it if you want. Place into oven and cook 55 minutes.

Voila! You just made your first pie, like me! Or unlike me, this may be your 5th pie (or some other number higher than 1).