Introduction: Strawberry Banana Cream Pie

About: I grew up in Bozeman, Montana and am currently attending Montana State University. I love Instructables and have used all sorts of tutorials from this site countless times. I love to learn new stuff and work h…

A while back I was on a road trip with my family, and after an entire day of driving I was pretty hungry. We eventually stopped at a country store that had a restaurant. Craving some banana cream pie I went to see if they had any, which they didn't. But, the waitress did ask if she could interest me in some banana cream pie with strawberries on top. I figured I would give it a try. Best decision ever! Being that this restaurant was hundreds of miles away from anywhere, I eventually decided that I needed to figure out how to make this amazing pie.

My family has its fair share of cooking and baking enthusiasts, so after mentioning that I had the greatest pie I've ever eaten while on my trip, they all hopped right on to trying to duplicate this piece of epicurean heaven. After a few months and a few . . . less than perfect attempts, they finally did it. I hope this tutorial is simple enough to understand and that all of your taste buds can experience the bliss mine have.

Step 1: What You Need

Supplies
Mixing bowls
Pie pan (9")
Rolling pin
Measuring cups
Measuring spoons
Spatula
Saucepan
Fork
Pastry Cutter
Spoon
Knife

Ingredients (Total amounts)
Flour: 1 2/3 cups (plus some extra for your working space)
Sugar: 1 cup
Vanilla Extract: 2 teaspoons
Milk (2% or Whole): 3 cups
Eggs: 4
Salt: 1/2 teaspoon
Butter: 3 Tablespoons
Crisco: 1/3 cup
Strawberries: Approximately 2 16oz packages
Strawberry Glaze (We use Marie's glaze for Strawberries, If you can't get this glaze, get the best you can find.): Approximately 14oz
Bananas: Approximately 5 large ones (Use ripe bananas rather than greenish ones or completely black ones)
(and a little bit of water)

Step 2: The Crust

Supplies
Pie pan
mixing bowl
rolling pin
pastry cutter
fork

Ingredients
Flour: 1 cup
Crisco (or other vegetable shortening): 1/3 cup
Salt: 1/4 teaspoon
Water: 1 Table spoon AT A TIME! (actual amount varies)


The crust is fairly straight forward. Put 1 cup of flour and 1/4 teaspoon salt into a bowl and mix it up. Then put in 1/3 cup of Crisco into the bowl and use the pastry cutter to cut it into the flour and salt. Once the Crisco is pea sized you'll want to SLOWLY add a little bit of of water (1 tablespoon at a time) and work it into the mixture with a fork until the flour mixture has become dough (Don't over mix the Crisco and flour or else the crust will be very tough!). The exact amount of water isn't always the same, rather play it by sight, but keep in mind that too much water will make the crust tough and soggy. I have pictures of what the mixture should look like throughout the process. 

The next step is to shape the dough into the shape of your pan. First, spread a thin coating of flour over the top of your counter or tabletop. The flour should keep the dough from sticking. Put some on your rolling pin too so that the dough doesn't stick to that either (add flour to the rolling pin frequently as it tends to rub off). Then you'll want to roll the dough into a flat roughly circular shape. Once it is as thick as you want the crust to be, place the flattened dough into the pie pan. (Some people do this by folding the dough in half, then dragging it half way into the pan and then unfolding the dough, in order to keep it from ripping.)

Now you want to make the crust look a little better. Start by ripping off the excess dough that is hanging over the edge of the pie pan, but leave about a quarter of an inch or so. Then fold the quarter of an inch of dough underneath the edge of the crust so that you have a smooth edge all the way around. (What this should look like is included in the pictures)

This next part is what will make your pie look like it was professionally made. At this point the crust needs to be shaped, and we do this with our fingers. Take your thumb and pointer finger and place in against the top edge of the crust, coming from the inside. Now take your other thumb and push the crust between your other two fingers, coming from the outside. Repeat this process all the way around the crust. (The pictures illustrate this step very well.)

Once the edges are complete, take a fork and poke it all over the inside bottom and sides of the pie crust, this should keep it from bubbling up while it is baking. Bake the crust for about 10 minutes (We live in the mountains, so it may vary depending on how high above sea level you live) at 350 deg. Fahrenheit. Bake the crust longer or shorter as you see fit until it is a light gold color. Once the crust has been baked, it should be allowed to cool before putting any of the filling in it.

Step 3: The Banana Filling- Pt. 1

Supplies
Saucepan
Spatula
Mixing bowl
Measuring cups
Measuring spoons
Egg yolk separator (if you have one)

Ingredients
Sugar: 1 cup
Flour: 2/3 cup
Salt: 1/4 teaspoon
Butter: 3 Tablespoons
Vanilla Extract: 2 teaspoons
Milk (2% or Whole): 3 cups
Eggs: 4

To begin, mix 1 cup of sugar, 2/3 cup of flour, and 1/4 teaspoon of salt in the saucepan and mix well. Then add 1 cup of milk into the saucepan. You only add one cup of milk to start because it is much easier to mix everything together and to get rid of the lumps of flour. Once everything is fairly well mixed you can add 2 more cups of milk and mix it together a little bit more. Cook this on the stove over a medium heat, while continuously stirring, until the substance becomes thick and is bubbling. Now reduce the heat slightly and continue to cook for another 2 minutes (We actually use a timer for this part). Remove this from the heat and set aside for just a minute (We will be using the stove again in just a minute).

Now we need to separate the yolks from the eggs, because we don't use the egg whites for this pie. If you have an egg yolk separator, great! However, if you're like me then you don't. No worries, just crack the egg in half and transfer the egg yolk from one half of the shell to the other while losing some egg white each time you transfer the yolk. Once the egg white is all gone put the yolk in a mixing bowl. Repeat this for the remaining three eggs, and then beat the eggs with a fork.

After the yolks have been beaten, gradually add about 1 cup of the heated mixture from above to the egg yolks while stirring. After mixing this together you can return the egg mixture back to the saucepan while stirring. Once everything is in the saucepan, cook for 2-2.5 more minutes at a medium heat, while continuously stirring, and then remove from heat.

Now add 3 Tablespoons of butter and 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract. Mix these in very well, you don't want any patches of vanilla extract that are overpowering. After the butter and vanilla are mixed in, cool this part of the filling in a refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

Step 4: The Strawberry Topping

Supplies
Knife
Mixing bowl
Paper towels
Spoon
Colander (optional but helpful)

Ingredients
Strawberries: 2 16oz packages (we only used 1 1/2 packages, but you can use more if you want)
Strawberry glaze: aprox. 14oz

While the banana filling is cooling down, we can start preparing the strawberry topping. This might be the easiest step, except for trying to resist eating the strawberries, that part is pretty hard. Begin by slicing up the strawberries into the colander. The original pie I had just put the entire strawberry on with the stem cut off, but I prefer thick slices of strawberry. You can decide which you would prefer. Once you are done with all of the slicing you'll want to rinse the strawberries with water to make sure they are completely clean. After rinsing the strawberries need to be dried off, so first shake out any excess water, and then pour them onto a paper towel or a normal hand towel and pat them dry. Once dry, the strawberries can be put in your mixing bowl and you can add the strawberry glaze, we use just about an entire container that contains 14oz of glaze. The best stuff that we've found so far is Marie's Glaze for Strawberries, but I suppose that any glaze would work. Next, simply mix up the strawberries with the glaze.

Step 5: Banana Filling- Pt. 2

Supplies
Spoon
Knife

Ingredients
Cooled custard portion of the banana filling from pt. 1
Bananas: approx. 5
Crust

Now that the custard part of the banana filling has cooled down a little bit we'll add some bananas. We used 4 large bananas because I believe that a banana cream pie should have some chunks of banana in it, not banana flavoring. Take out the cooled custard part of the filling and slice the bananas into the pan. Thin slices will get mushed easier, so we prefer somewhat larger slices of banana, but that depends on your own preference. 

Once the bananas have been sliced into the pan you'll want to take your spoon and gently mix the bananas into the custard portion by hand. Rather than just mixing it, try to flip the bottom onto the top by slipping your spoon underneath everything and then pulling up and flipping the contents of the spoon onto the top of what is in the bowl. It is somewhat difficult to describe this part so I tried to take pictures of it. But if you can't figure out what I am saying, as long as you are careful not to mush the bananas and you mix it up well it doesn't really matter how you mix them together.

Step 6: Putting It All Together

Now that each individual part of the pie has been made, it is time to put it all together. Take the completed banana filling and pour it into the crust, smoothing it out so that it fills the entire crust and is relatively flat on the top. Next, take the strawberry topping and pour it onto the banana filling and spread it around until it covers the entire pie.

(By the way, all of the pictures in this tutorial are from my camera, the one picture of the completed pie that has an all white background is a result of the flash from the camera) 


Step 7: Enjoy!

Chill the pie for about two hours and your pie is ready to eat! Whipped cream compliments the pie very nicely, but not everyone likes it. If you decide to use whipped cream you can be as creative with whatever patterns or designs you use. If you feel like being a geek, or if you're entering a contest for Pi Day, a pi symbol looks pretty awesome. 

I hope this tutorial made it so that anyone can make this pie, whether it be somebody who's never made a pie before or an expert baker. This pie is my favorite and a lot of tweaking has been done to get the recipe just right. I hope you all enjoy! 

Some stuff to keep in mind
The pie is best if eaten either the day it was made or the next day. It is still edible for a few more days, but the bananas aren't quite as good.
The amount of bananas, strawberries, and strawberry glaze can change depending on preference or availability, but the amounts that I listed we've found the most people like.
If you liked the tutorial or the recipe feel free to give me a vote for the pi day competition!

Pi Day Pie Challenge

Participated in the
Pi Day Pie Challenge