For Thanksgiving, our guest blogger Gregoire Michaud shares his twist on the sweet American classic

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Pumpkin pie was a concept unknown to my palate until I first moved to the US to work back in 1998, in Colorado Springs. And not far behind the unknown pie was Thanksgiving, a holiday which I had also never heard of. Back then, I was very much anchored in European traditions; the things I knew about the US was pretty much everything I saw on Beverly Hills 90210, or via Will Smith on the Prince of Bel Air (for those of you who know it, you can picture what I mean!).

As I was by myself in the States, I was invited by an American family for Thanksgiving. Wow! It was the first time I tried marshmallow topping on sweet mashed potatoes and, together with that, a glass of milk with a roasted turkey. Ah! The turkey…  The largest roasted poultry we had back home was chicken or duck and when I saw that giant roasted bird I thought, “America really makes everything bigger!”

Seriously, I wasn’t sure if all these foods were meant to be like that, and I later learned that it was the tradition – I guess this is what we call cultural differences. Then came the pecan pie and the pumpkin pie; I liked them both very much, with a preference for the latter, although the lingering whiskey flavour in the pecan pie was very pleasant. The pumpkin pie was delicious; yet, this huge mass of spiced pumpkin curd was rather “boring” in texture, especially after the third slice!

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A few weeks ago, I happened to be invited as a judge for a cake competition in Macau. And again, I had this overall sensation of having massive cream and mousse layers built on a tiny sponge or biscuit.  I wished there was more to balance out the overall experience.

So, I thought what would I do differently? With Thanksgiving approaching, I thought of doing a little touch up to the classic pumpkin pie. Nothing changed in the recipe; it’s a true-to-the-heart classic pumpkin pie, made with fresh pumpkin, cloves, ginger and cinnamon. As a matter of fact, I added pumpkin seeds in the dough for the crust to make it even more interesting in terms of texture.

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To give it a better balance, I measured three layers of curd and three layers of crust in equal proportions to give me an inch tall hybrid tart/cake, and it turned out visually very attractive and in perfect balance of textures. It was a bit tricky to bake the pumpkin curd as a whole tray to later freeze it and cut circles out of, but it was worth the effort. Not too much crust and not too much curd. With that, I added a little crystallized rosemary to bring a touch of herbal flavour which contrasted very well with the overall roundness of the pumpkin flavour.

At the cake competition, one of the contestants had up to six different flavours in a single cake.  As you bit into the many layers, the flavours get mixed and confused. The point I am trying to make here is that a cake doesn’t have to be the usual 3-inches tall (or sometimes ridiculously more); it can be lower, well balanced and elegant. Flavours can be limited to two or three and need to contrast with each other.  Colours can be subtle, simple, yet attractive. Of course, I am not reinventing the wheel here. A very simple crust, with a nice pumpkin filling is all you need as long as it is made with love and care. Happy Thanksgiving!