Salted Honey Pie

Updated: Aug 21, 2021

A pie that pleases just about everyone.

I first discovered the salted honey pie when I came across an article spotlighting Four & Twenty Blackbirds, an inventive pie shop in Brooklyn, NY. I was immediately intrigued, and went down a rabbit hole of recipe hunting to make one myself, since Brooklyn is not a hop across town. What I ended up with, after two tries (the first was admittedly a bit of a disaster), is now one of my favorite desserts. It's smooth and caramel-y, not-too-rich and made even more excellent with a generous dollop of whipped cream.

A few months later I went to Four & Twenty Blackbirds during a visit to New York, and tried another intriguing flavor, their black sesame pie. That pie in turn inspired me to put an interesting twist on the salted honey one, adding a dark chocolate black tahini layer.

I personally prefer the classic salted honey pie with no twist, but my trusted taste testers (aka friends with an appetite) gave the tahini later a thumbs up, so I'm including that here for you more adventurous eaters.

Salted Honey Pie

Ingredients:

1 pie crust
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup honey
2 tsp vanilla extra
3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/2 tsp salt
2 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
sea salt for topping
whipped cream for topping

Optional chocolate tahini layer:

1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup black tahini
1 tsp honey

Key Supplies: deep dish pie pan, mixing bowls, whisk, saucepan, wooden mixing spoon

Directions:

Line pie pan with crust, and preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
In a mixing bowl, beat together egg yolks. Add honey and vanilla and mix until combined.
In a saucepan, combine brown sugar, cornstarch, and salt until well mixed, and then add in heavy cream. Heat up on stovetop at medium heat while continuously stirring, until the mixture thickens and reaches a bubbling boil.
Remove from heat, and add a small scoop of the custard mixture to the egg mixture and mix together quickly, to temper the eggs (this prevents them cooking with the sudden addition of heat). Add remaining custard mixture.
If doing the chocolate tahini layer, mix together tahini, chocolate chips, and honey in a bowl and microwave at 15 second intervals until melted, taking out the bowl to mix between each interval. Spread this evenly across the base of the pie crust.
Pour the custard mixture into your prepared crust, and bake for 45 minutes, until the top is golden brown (it will still be jiggly).
Let pie cool to room temperature, and then refrigerate for a few hours until it is set.
Before serving, sprinkle sea salt on top, and have whipped cream at the ready! It should keep a few days in the fridge, if it lasts that long.