Mississippi Mud Pie

 Hi Friends! I am trying to be a better person and blog more frequently so you have some delicious recipes to check out on this site. While I'm not necessarily doing that much better, you have to admit, I've improved slightly! Last month I even participated in the Daring Bakers Challenge for the first time in a while annnddd I have plans to participate in this month's challenge too! Go me. Ohhhh and one more thing to brag about: I am trying to be more technologically savvy - I got Twitter! Can you believe it?? If you want to follow, click on the follow me button on the right hand side of my blog. :) Woot!

Its not that I haven't been cooking and baking - oh, that doesn't cease around here... I just haven't been photographing things and when I do get inspired to take photos, I take photos of the beginning stages and then get too lazy to take photos of the finished food. :( I'm not really quite sure why this lack of motivation is going on, but I am trying to improve!! So you can imagine my joy when I finally managed to photograph some finished baked goods: I made this Mississippi Mud Pie on Rememberance day weekend.  And I'm blogging about it already because I'm excited to share such a yummy recipe with you!

 Mississippi Mud Pie
Recipe adapted from Gordon Ramsay's World Kitchen

Ingredients:

• 7 oz (200g) graham crackers
• generous 1/4 cup lightly salted butter, diced
• 2 oz (60g) good-quality semisweet chocolate, chopped (I just used chocolate chips)
• 6.5 oz good-quality semisweet chocolate, chopped (I just used chocolate chips)
• generous 3/4 cup butter, diced
• 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
• scant 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
• scant 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• generous 3/4 cup heavy cream
• another generous 1/2 cup heavy cream, well chilled
• 2-3 tbsp confectioners sugar, to taste
• chocolate shavings, to finish

Method:

1. To make the base, whirl the graham crackers in your food processor until they form fine crumbs. Tip into a large bowl. Melt the butter and chocolate together in a heatproof bowl in the microwave (my microwave has a melt chocolate and melt butter function that gently melts delicate things like chocolate and butter than burn easily, if your microwave doesn't have this function, do this in a double boiler on your stove). Mix until smooth, pour onto the graham crumbs and mix until evenly combined.
2. Tip the crumb mixture into a 9" tart pan with a removable base. Using the back of a spoon, press the mixture into the base and up the sides of the pan to cover evenly. Chill to allow the base to firm up. Preheat oven to 350F.
3. To make the filling, melt chocolate together in a heatproof bowl in your microwave (same story as in step 1). In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the eggs and brown sugars together until thick and doubled in volume. Whisk in the cream, then fold through the melted chocolate and butter.
4. Pour the mixture over the cookie base and bake in the oven for about 45 (mine too just over 50 minutes) minutes until just firm. Allow to cool completely before removing from the pan (if making in advance, remove from the fridge at least 30 minutes before serving as chocolate filling will set and harden when cold).
5. For the topping, whip the cream with confectioners sugar and a splash of vanilla until it holds soft peaks. Spread over top of the cooled pie and finish with a scattering of chocolate shavings. Cut into slices and serve.

This is a fairly easy dessert to make and is great to serve to company because it tastes great and your guests will think you put in a load of effort. Maybe some of my American friends will incorporate this into their Thanksgiving menus this weekend??!!! :D

Happy Baking my Friends!