Impossible Pistachio Peach Pie with Cardamom

Impossible Pistachio Peach Pie with Cardamom 

Wouldn’t you know that my friend Jeanne’s icecream machine wouldn’t hold all of the pistachio kulfi mixture she prepared, and so we had two cups of leftover “goo”, as she calls it. 

Consequently, I adapted this recipe from Best Recipes Food Well Shared, using the “goo” as the milk base, and adding extra sugar to taste, in my case, jaggery powder.  Knowing that most of you won’t have a Jeanne who happens to leave two cups of leftover magic in your fridge, I’ve broken this recipe down to what people generally do have on hand.  However, if you do make Jeanne's Pistachio Kulfi, and you do have leftover mixture, this flexible recipe will show you those steps too.

The recipe for Impossible Pie has been around for at least thirty-five years, but often with a certain factory made biscuit mix.  An Impossible Pie is usually a custardy confection which forms its own crust.  I like the Best Recipes version, as it doesn’t use the factory made stuff, and let’s me use flour and coconut instead. 

Although I’ve made countless versions of this pie in the past, I whumped up this newly invented-by-me creation, without any test run, and dared to take it to a party.  (I figured that if it was a complete bust, we could always stop at a bakery on the way, but luckily it turned out as well as I’d arrogantly expected!)

4 eggs
1 cup desiccated finely shredded coconut
½ cup white flour
½ cup melted butter
1 cup milk
1 cup whipping cream
¾ cup powdered jaggery
½ teaspoon rosewater
½ cup pistachios, shelled, roasted, but unsalted
1 teaspoon freshly ground green cardamom 

Boiling water to cover
4 ripe peaches
¼ cup powdered jaggery
a pinch more of ground fresh green cardamom

Preheat oven to 350 F and line cake pan with parchment paper.  Assuming that you are starting from scratch, toss all of the first group of ingredients  into a blender, and buzz till the pistachios are finely ground and the mixture is liquefied.  Set aside.  (If you’re using leftover Kulfi goo, because your icecream machine is also too small to handle our Kulfi recipe, then realize you must use the first four ingredients, and two cups of “goo”, omitting the ingredients written in blue.  In that case, sweeten to taste.)

Place peaches in a deep bowl, and pour boiling water over them.  Let sit for about a minute, then lift out one by one to peel, slice and arrange on bottom of cake pan. 

Whether you’re starting from scratch or leftover “goo”, remove a tablespoon of jaggery powder from the quarter cup, and set aside. Sprinkle the (almost) quarter cup of jaggery over the peaches.  Pour the batter over the peaches.  Because I was using the famous “goo” as my base, I decided to grind a little more cardamom, and sprinkled this on top of the batter, just to be sure there would be lots of cardamom flavour. 

Bake for 45 minutes or till a toothpick comes out clean.  Sprinkle the remaining tablespoon of jaggery powder over the hot pie, to give it a bit more sweetness and colour.  Place on a rack and let cool, then chill.  Slice and serve. 



After removing from pan, I confess to picking off a bit where it had crumbled, and I tasted and tested at that point!

Whether you use the pistachio kulfi leftover “goo” base as I did, (in which case you can follow Jeanne’s original recipe and not redundantly add items as the pistachios and such) or you follow the entire list above, the result will be a quick and easy custard pie that is both comforting and delightful.  With peaches, pistachios, cream, cardamom and jaggery, how could you possibly go wrong?