Sunday, October 18, 2009

Halloween Pie

Back when I lived in Kyoto, I spent a lot of time window shopping (and really shopping as well) in the Kawaramachi-Teramachi area. Right across the street from the Takashimaya department store, source of all things beautiful and beyond my English-teacher price range, was the Kobeya bakery, source of all things tasty and not so far beyond my budget that I couldn't go there once in a while. I don't remember if I discovered the Halloween Pie my first year in Japan or my second, but it certainly made an impression on me when I did. It was one of the things I mourned when I moved away, and one of the things I looked forward to finding again when I moved back to Japan. Since Kobe is a Kansai city, whereas Tokyo is in the Kanto, I was a little worried that Tokyo wouldn't have any Kobeya bakeries. But yay! it does, and in October they have Halloween Pie.

Given my obsession with kabocha pumpkin, it's hardly surprising that I would fall so hard for the sweet pastry version. The filling is almost straight kabocha, including little bits of the skin, doctored with just a bit of sugar, butter, and perhaps egg, as well as rum-infused raisins. The texture is much heavier and more solid than American-style pumpkin pie, which is basically pumpkin custard. But instead of the short crust used in the U.S. version, this pumpkin pie is encased in puff pastry cut into a jack o'lantern shape (the best part is the stem) and coated in a shiny glaze. They make two sizes, small (more crust) and large (more filling, and my personal preference, shown here).

It's the perfect Halloween treat - scarily good. Probably it's just as well they only sell it one month a year.

Kobeya Kitchen - Hiroo shop

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