Coconut Pudding Pie

          My personalized graham cracker crust creation.

As promised, I'm putting up more recipes on here, though I still feel like I've lost some of the people who used to come and visit. :( Sad. I hope you all come back though! I do again apologize for my bad pictures. I don't have a very good camera at all, nor am I able to turn the flash off b/c I don't know how.

I kind of felt like I was in a baking rut...I was tired of doing bars, brownies, cookies, or candies, so why not make a pie? To be honest, I'm not a huge fan of pies in general. I don't like pastries or crusts or anything of that sort, especially doughnuts--gross. 

I found this recipe off of www.pillsbury.com I wanted to make a pie with a fruity filling, and once I saw this Choose-your-own Filling Pie I was heart-set on using coconut. I did modify their original recipe, using Coconut Creme Pudding instead of vanilla and I also used a graham cracker crust instead of a crescent roll crust, which sounds weird to me. To make this extra special, I had the brilliant idea (humble I know) of smearing a layer of melted chocolate on top of the graham cracker crust. Once my mom tried this pie, she informed me that every pie ever made will HAVE to have chocolate on top of the graham cracker crust. This pie is super easy to make and only takes about 10 min. to make it. 

Moment of honesty: I haven't tried this pie. I did try a little of the filling and it was good--very light. This would be a great summer pie b/c you wouldn't feel heavy and gross and after it. Oh yeah, go check out Pillsbury's website! They have a ton of wonderful recipes on it.

Ingredients:

1 graham pie crust

3/4 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

1 box (4 serving) of Coconut Creme instant pudding and pie filling mix (if your store doesn't carry it, Vanilla works too)

1 3/4 cups milk

2 tsp. coconut extract

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 cups frozen (thawed) whipped topping

1/4 cup shredded coconut, toasted

Directions:

Melt the chocolate chips in the microwave until smooth, about 2 min. Spread carefully and evenly over the graham cracker crust. Put in freezer for around 5 min. or until the chocolate is hardened.

Make pudding mix as directed on box, using 1 3/4 cups milk. Stir in vanilla and coconut extracts and the whipped topping. Spread on crust. Sprinkle with toasted coconut. Refrigerate at least 1 hour. Store covered in refrigerator.