Easiest Holiday Pie You’ll Ever Make

Cranberry Crustless Pie

While we may be taking a break from our renovation story posts as we prepare to move back to our home, I have a hard time not baking or cooking. Plus with it being the holidays, I love to spread cheer through yummy food. So thought I’d continue with some food posts as perhaps you’ll want to try out something new over the holidays.

Continuing with my cranberry kick, I really do believe this is the easiest pie I have ever made. Even easier than the Cranberry Holiday Cake featured a couple weeks ago, this is literally one of those recipes that simply requires you buy the ingredients — most of which you will already have on hand — and put them together by simply hand-mixing them . Voila — the pie is ready for the oven. Consequently, it’s a recipe that would be difficult to mess up, always a good thing during the holidays when many of us are making and baking multiple treats for family and friends. Plus it only takes about an hour to make including baking time - you can’t beat that if you are in a rush!

As I love to have Drury Lane neighbors as taste-testers and enjoyers of recipes, one of my favorite neighborhood taste testers, a budding almost 9-year-old chef and food critic, confirmed the yumminess of this treat - check out Genna Tatum’s review at the end. I also had a neighbor tell me he enjoyed this for breakfast which I can totally see given the taste and texture of this crustless pie. It is as the name says, a crustless pie; however, baking it until golden brown will give it some crisp on the top. It holds together very well; if it were savory, it might be compared to the consistency of a quiche.

On top of delicious cranberries, it has a wonderful almond taste and is jazzed up with nuts - your choice depending on what you happen to have in the pantry - almonds pair nicely with the almond extract you add to the mixture, walnuts are also yummy. And I’m sure you can add other types of nuts. This time I decided to go for a pie with full nut gusto - slivered almonds and chopped walnuts both of which I had dwindling amounts in my pantry, so why not use them up?

I recommend serving this super-easy dessert warm with vanilla bean ice cream or with whipped cream or why not both?! But I’ve also had friends tell me they like it at room temperature all by itself. Hope you enjoy trying this supremely easy and yummy dessert.

Thanks to Allrecipes.com for the foundational recipe!

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
2 cups fresh cranberries
½ cup chopped walnuts, slivered or chopped almonds or any nut you may have on hand (If combining nuts, I usually add a bit more than 1/2 cup. )
½ cup butter, melted
2 eggs
1-2 teaspoons almond extract depending on how much almond flavor you like; I consistently use 2

9-inch pie pan works best for this recipe.

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease one pie pan.
Combine the flour, sugar, and salt. Stir in the cranberries and the walnuts, and toss to coat. Stir in the butter, beaten eggs, and almond extract. If you are using frozen cranberries, the mixture will be very thick. Spread the batter into the prepared pan.
Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 35-45 minutes, or until a wooden pick inserted near the center comes out clean. Serve warm with whipped cream or ice cream.

Prepping Ingredients: 15-20 minutes