Vintage Sour Cream Raisin Pie

An old-fashioned raisin cream pie recipe made with sour cream, warm spices, pecans (or walnuts) topped with whipped cream that’s perfect for Thanksgiving!

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Husband often talks about old-fashioned dessert recipes his mom made when he was a kid. I thought we Southerners had the market cornered on heirloom desserts, but it appears Canadians can give us a run for our money!

One he talks about a lot is a Boiled Raisin Cake. I asked her about it once while we were up for a visit and she told me it was a bit of this and a pinch of that and you cook it till it looks just so.

And since I was in another country, had half a bottle of wine in me and was on vacation mode, I didn't retain much of the conversation.

Still on the hunt, I decided to look through a bunch of my old cookbooks to see what I could find. I love any excuse to pull out my collection.

I have a box of old community and church cookbooks from all over with yellowed pages and missing covers. I love looking at recipes with ingredients like oleo and sweet milk. You can’t find that kind of nostalgia on the internet.

I especially like to look for old cookbooks like these when I’m traveling. I’m pretty familiar with most classic Southern recipes so stumbling onto old cookbooks from other parts of the world is fascinating to me!

I didn't find a Boiled Raisin Cake like Husband described but I did find something called a Sour Cream Raisin Pie.

I kept trying to ignore the pie because I was after a cake but I couldn't get it out of my mind. The sour cream cooks up almost like a caramel and the raisins plump up and get all lovely and the whole thing is wrapped in a warm blanket of cinnamon and nutmeg.

I had to try it.

I found several recipes and while they all had the same basic ingredients, the amounts varied greatly. And so did the cooking method.

Some cooked on the stove and some baked in the oven. I decided to go with the stove-top method for the custard because then I could taste and tweak as I went along instead of throwing it all in the oven to cook and hoping for the best.

I hashed out what I thought would be a good ingredients list then started cooking!

I AM SO HAPPY I MADE THIS RECIPE! I love what happens to the sour cream when you cook it with sugar on the stove! I had no idea sour cream could transform into something like this! 

I was tempted to leave the words “sour cream” out of the recipe title because the filling is NOTHING like sour cream and I know there are folks who won’t try this because of the name.

I get it. It doesn’t even sound very good. Sour cream and raisins are not ingredients that conjure up mouthwatering cravings or entice midnight refrigerator raids. But they are the main stars of the recipe so there’s really no way around it.

When researching the recipe, I saw some topped with meringue, some topped with whipped cream and a few without anything on top.

I decided to just top mine with Cool Whip. Before you get all preachy at me about Cool Whip, here’s my 2-cents on the topic… real whipped cream doesn't stay whipped forever so if I know something I’m making is going to spend a few days in the fridge before we’ll eat it all, I use Cool Whip. If I’m serving guests, I’ll usually use real whipped cream since it will all be eaten immediately.

The best thing is that you can top your pie with whatever your heart desires! 

If you want to make something different for Thanksgiving or Christmas, definitely give this vintage pie a try. It has all the warm notes of a pumpkin or apple pie so it’ll feel like the holidays, but it won’t be the same-ol’, same-ol’!

UPDATE: I finally figured out how to make the Boiled Raisin Cake. I LOVE IT. And I understand now why it holds such a sweet spot in Husband’s heart – it’s surprisingly delicious! Click here for the recipe.

Recipe for Vintage Sour Cream Raisin Pie

Vintage Sour Cream Raisin Pie

Yield: 1 Pie

Author: Mandy Rivers | South Your Mouth

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 15 MinTotal time: 25 Min

An old-fashioned raisin cream pie recipe made with sour cream, sugar and raisins and pecans (or walnuts) with warm spices, and whipped cream topping. Perfect for Thanksgiving!

Ingredients

• 1 deep dish pie pastry shell
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1.5 tablespoons flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
• 2-3 cups cool whip
• Additional cinnamon for dusting

Instructions

1. Cook pie pastry crust per package instructions then set aside.
2. Combine sugar, sour cream, egg, flour, vanilla, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg in a saucepan and stir well until combined and smooth. 1 C each sugar and sour cream, 1 egg, 1.5 Tbsp flour, 1 tsp vanilla, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp each cinnamon, nutmeg
3. Stir in raisins then heat and stir over medium heat until slightly boiling. Once slightly boiling, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes or until mixture has thickened. 1 C raisins
4. Stir in nuts then pour filling into pie shell. Cool to room temperature then refrigerate, uncovered, until cold. Once cold, top pie with cool whip then dust with cinnamon. 1/2 C nuts, 2-3 C Cool Whip
5. Cover and refrigerate to store.

Notes

• I almost always double the recipe when I make this.
• A double batch of filling will fill 2 deep-dish or 3 regular pie crusts.
• You can use all-purpose or self-rising flour in this recipe.
• Do not use light or fat free sour cream in this recipe - the filling will not cook properly.
• I don't know if these can be frozen. I *think* so but have never tried it myself.

https://www.southyourmouth.com/2014/09/sour-cream-raisin-pie.html

Images and text © South Your Mouth LLC 2014

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