No Fail Homemade Pumpkin Pie
How to make classic, unfussy pumpkin pie from scratch. This is our favorite way to make pumpkin pie. It’s easy, too! Jump to the Homemade Pumpkin Pie Recipe or watch our quick recipe video showing you how to make it.
Watch Us Make Pumpkin Pie
How to Make Our Favorite Pumpkin Pie Recipe
We take it plain or, when feeling feisty, with a dollop of softly whipped cream. The pie filling is creamy, rich and has just enough sweetness to balance some spice from cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. You can easily go for an extra slice at the end of dinner. Don’t tell anyone, but we’ve even stolen a few bites for breakfast.
Making this pumpkin pie from scratch is easy — we think it’s one of the simplest (and tastiest) pies you can make at home.
The filling comes together in minutes and is made from pumpkin puree, eggs, cream, sugar, and fall spices. Everything is mixed together and poured into a pie crust. You can use canned or homemade pumpkin puree in this pie. I love the pie when we’ve used canned (especially since it is so consistent), but making your own puree is easy and means the pie is 100% homemade. (Bonus, you get to roast the pumpkin seeds. Here’s our easy recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds.)
We don’t add too many spices either — we like how the pumpkin gets a chance to shine. If you love spicier pies, just bump up the spice amounts listed in the recipe below.
For the crust, we use our own homemade pie dough. Our favorite crust calls for 100% butter and is pretty simple to make. You can even make it well in advance and refrigerate or freeze it until you are ready to make the full pie. If you have a favorite store-bought pie crust, then use it. It’s completely up to you.
The Crust – Blind Bake or not?
We’re usually partial to blind baking single-crust pies — especially those with liquid fillings. With that said, we don’t blind bake when making pumpkin pie. “Blind baking” means to partially cook the crust before adding the filling, which helps the crust stay crisp and flaky.
With pumpkin pie, though, we love how the crust becomes moistened a little from the filling. The base of the crust browns, but where the filling and crust meet, it’s soft and tender. That’s how we saw our mothers make it as kids, so we just can’t stray.
If you want to blind bake the crust, go for it. Line your pie dish with dough, prick the bottom with a fork and line with foil. Fill the foil with pie weights (or use uncooked rice or beans) then bake in a 450-degree oven for 8 minutes. Remove the foil (and weights) then bake another 5 to 6 minutes, or until golden. From there, fill the crust as usual and bake until the filling sets.
More Pumpkin Recipes
- Easy Pumpkin Mac and Cheese — How to make extra creamy pumpkin mac and cheese in under 1 hour. The perfect Fall dinner!
- Homemade Pumpkin Pancakes — We love these pumpkin pancakes: not too sweet with a hint of spice.
- Seriously Good Pumpkin Cupcakes — These moist spiced pumpkin cupcakes are hard to beat.
- Perfectly Spiced Pumpkin Scones — How to make the best spiced pumpkin scones inspired by Starbucks.
- Chocolate Orange Pumpkin Bread — This quick bread has pumpkin, orange, and is packed with chopped chocolate. Not too sweet, extremely moist and perfect for fall!
- Homemade Pumpkin Spice Latte — How to make the best pumpkin spice latte at home with pumpkin puree, coffee, milk, and fall spices. Better than store-bought!
For more pie recipes, check out Our Favorite Apple Pie from scratch, Easy Homemade Blueberry Pie, this delicious Cherry Pie from Scratch and our Fresh Strawberry Pie topped with whipped cream.
Recipe updated, originally posted October 2013. Since posting this in 2013, we have added a recipe video and tweaked the recipe to be more clear. – Adam and Joanne
No Fail Homemade Pumpkin Pie
- PREP
This is a classic, unfussy pumpkin pie recipe. We take it plain or, when feeling feisty, with a dollop of softly whipped cream. The spices are not overpowering, here. If you like your pie spicy, increase the cinnamon and ginger a little. (We’d stay away from increasing the cloves, a 1/4-teaspoon should suffice).
Makes 1 (9-inch) pie
You Will Need
Chilled pie dough for one single-crust 9-inch pie, see our pie crust recipe
3 large eggs 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
1/3 cup (65 grams) light brown sugar
1 (15-ounce) can pure pumpkin puree or 2 cups (440 grams) fresh pumpkin puree, see our homemade pumpkin puree recipe
3/4 cup (175 ml) heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
Directions
- Prepare Crust
- Make Filling
- Bake the Pie
- To Finish
Roll out the dough so that it is two inches larger than your pie dish. Gently press dough down into the dish so that it lines the bottom and sides. (Be careful not to pull or stretch the dough). Trim dough to within 1/2-inch of the dish edge.
Fold edges of dough underneath itself, creating a thicker, 1/4-inch border that rests on the lip of the dish. Crimp edges. (You can see us do this in our pie crust recipe video). Refrigerate while you make the pie filling.
Whisk eggs and both sugars together until smooth. Add pumpkin puree, cream, vanilla, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and the salt. Stir until well blended.
Heat oven to 425 degrees F.
Transfer pie shell to a baking sheet. Pour pumpkin filling into the pie shell.
Bake pie at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 375 degrees and bake 35 to 45 minutes or until a toothpick or thin knife plunged it into the pie, about 2 inches from the edge, comes out clean. Rotate once or twice during baking. If, while the pie bakes, the tops of the crust becomes too dark, cover with a thin strip of aluminum foil.
Cool on a wire rack for 2 hours or until room temperature. Cut into eight wedges and serve alone or topped with whipped cream. To store, cover the cooled pie loosely with foil or plastic wrap and keep in the refrigerator up to 3 days.
Adam and Joanne's Tips
- How to tell the pie is done: Take the pie out of the oven when the majority of the pie looks shiny and set on top. It should jiggle a little like jello, but not much more. The middle will still look wet on top. This is okay, it will continue to cook as the pie cools on the counter. And, as a final test, grab a toothpick or thin knife then plunge it into the pie, about 2 inches from the edge. If it comes out clean, the pie is done. As the pie sits until cooled to room temperature, it will continue to cook and set. We wait for 2 hours. If, when you cut into the pie, the middle does not seem to be set, let it cool a little longer. Or, cut the slice anyway and cover the end with whipped cream. It will still taste great.
- Nutrition facts: The nutrition facts provided below are estimates. We have used the USDA database to calculate approximate values.
If you make this recipe, snap a photo and hashtag it #inspiredtaste — We love to see your creations on Instagram and Facebook! Find us: @inspiredtaste
Nutrition Per Serving: Serving Size 1 slice (1/8th of pie) / Calories 365 / Protein 6 g / Carbohydrate 38 g / Dietary Fiber 2 g / Total Sugars 21 g / Total Fat 22 g / Saturated Fat 13 g / Cholesterol 131 mg
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Can I blind bake my pie crust before I fill it up with the filling? I am making this today for quests and a little nervous since I never baked a pie before without blind baking.
And if so, how long do you think I should blind bake it since your filling is lighter and easier than what I am used to make.
Thank you so much for wonderful recipes. Your focaccia bread is My kids ‘ absolute favorites. I made it so many times.I could make it in my sleep!
Made this for the expat community in India and everyone is raving about it. Many thanks, great, simple and authentic.
I’ve been making pumpkin pies for about 35 years, but I am always eager to try a new recipe. For some reason with this one, my crust was a tad underdone on the bottom, but that’s no big deal. The pie itself I thought lacked a little flavor, needed a little more cloves, or maybe some nutmeg. Overall decent, but not my favorite.
Amazing recipe! Made it today. Didn’t change a bit. Thank you!
This is one of the best pumpkin pies I’ve had. The texture is perfect but I find it too sweet. I will cut the sugar in half next time and it should be just perfect. The crust turned out great.
Can yuo use evaporated milk instead of heavy cream thank you
Hi Dennis, We recommend the heavy cream in this recipe. Evaporated milk is used in other pumpkin pie recipes, but it is sweeter than cream so I am not sure how it will affect the taste of our recipe.
Made my own crust, but the filling was terrific, everyone agreed this was the best-ever pumpkin pie!
I had never made a homemade pumpkin pie with fresh pumpkins before this but it turned out great. This was by far the best pumpkin pie I have ever had! My picky husband and guests loved it as well. It is sweet and perfectly spiced, thank you!
Soooooo, I used this recipe and made several pies for Thanksging, this is the first time I’ve ever made pumpkin pie from scratch.(I used my own pumpkins as well) It was out of this world delicious! I will never look for another recipe (I will also use your crust recipe for all pies). I asked about special high altitude instructions, nobody had any advice. My experience is, it takes a much longer time to bake. After turning down the oven to let them finish, I rotated them every 20 minutes and let them bake until they were done. It took about 90 minutes, possibly more as I didn’t pay real close attention to time when I realized they would be done when they were done.
The crust came out perfect from scratch. The texture and color of the pie was very good. However the taste was too spicy and not very sweet. I was disappointed to go to all this trouble and not get a good pie. However I will keep the crust recipe forever.
Hi Rose, We’re sorry the filling was too spicy for you. We really love to lean on the spices in the recipe, but you can always reduce them for next time (the cloves are probably what causes the pie to be on the spicy side for you). We are thrilled you enjoyed the crust! Thanks for your comment.
Spiced perfectly and everyone absolutely loved it, thank you!
I made this it turned out amazing. I used a premade gluten free crust. I subbed the heavy cream with nutpods dairy free creamer French vanilla. I did not have plain on hand. It waawas perfect as a sub. I also used coconut sugar in place of both sugars. I made my own pupkin puree. Any way great recipe even if I had to modify a bit it was a perfect pie.we are still enjoying it.
The food processor version of this pie crust recipe did not turn out for me. It looked like fine sand after just a few pulses and was very dry. I should have thrown it out right then. The final product was chewy and oily. A waste of time and money.
Hi J, So sorry about this. I’m not sure what went wrong here. When you process the butter and flour in the first step, you want to pulse until the two ingredients we well combined. If you take a look at our video at the top of the post, you can see what ours looked like.
This is a very good recipe. The ratio of eggs and cream works; it doesn’t become too mushy (which can happen with cream based recipes). Has a perfect “Libby’s” recipe consistency which, growing up, was our gold standard. I happened to use pumpkin pie spice instead (2.5 tsp) and it worked well. I also blind baked first, but using the Joy of Cooking’s blind bake instructions – only 5-7′ until warm to touch, and no fork pricking. (I don’t prick the crust bc sometimes the filling can seep through.) Will be keeping this recipe!!!
Recipe like my moms except she used 1 Tbls. pumpkin pie spice. It was wonderful