Pawpaw Banana Cream Pie

Submitted by Valeria

"My grandma and I decided to try making a pawpaw pie from a recipe we got at http://www.pawpaw.kysu.edu. Well, we ran out of pawpaw and had to fill in the rest with banana, we had to substitute half-and-half for light cream (which the original recipe called for), and it turned out pretty good. I learned a lot about pawpaw by working with this recipe. The skin is thin and attached to the pulp pretty well, so you need to peel it with a vegetable peeler. Also, the nickel-sized seeds are found throughout the fruit and come attached to a fair amount of pulp. It worked best for me to rub the seeds against a strainer to maximize the amount of pulp I got out of it. The seeds are covered with a membrane that's probably very nutricious, but if you're a texture eater you might not want this in your pie, as it's different from your chunks of soft fruit. I got 3/4 cups of pawpaw from two large fruits. Pawpaws come pretty small in the first place, so when I say large I mean the largest ones I saw in the bunch at the store. In Ohio, Whole Foods and Wild Oats carry the fruit. Ripe pawpaws are green with some dark brown or black spots on them. This is not an attractive or easy to work with fruit. It's mushy, messy to work with, and looks unappetizing with the skin on. This is a fruit that has only recently become cultivated for the market and genetic selectivity and spraying hasn't made it pretty like the painted oranges and waxed mangos you find in the store. A note to our Aussie and Kiwi friends: Pawpaw in North America is a tropical-like fruit native to the continent and not papaya."

 

• Ready In: 1hr 10mins
• Ingredients: 12
• Serves: 8

ingredients

• 3⁄4 cup white sugar
• 1⁄4 cup cornstarch
• 3 egg yolks, slightly beaten
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup half-and-half
• 3⁄4 cup pureed pawpaw
• 1⁄4 cup mashed banana
• 3 egg whites
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 1 pinch salt
• 1⁄2 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 9 inches baked pie crusts

directions

1. Combine sugar and corn starch. Add beaten egg yolks, milk and cream and mix well. Mix pawpaw pulp and mashed banana, add to egg mixture.
2. Cook and stir constantly over medium-low heat until thickened to the consistency of thick chunky pudding (think banana cream pie filling). Let cool.
3. Make meringue by beating the egg whites stiff with 3 tablespoons sugar, a pinch of salt and cream of tartar.
4. Pour custard into baked pastry shell and cover with meringue. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes or until meringue is browned.