Gluten Free Miniature Chocolate Pudding Pie (or tartlettes)

Gluten Free Pie Crust with Quick Microwave Chocolate Pudding 

Free of gluten, sugar, eggs, nuts, corn, soy with dairy free option

Gluten Free Miniature Chocolate Pudding Pie

This super awesome chocolate pudding pie was a total fluke.  I was trying to make a sugar-free lemon meringue pie... and... yeah, that really didn't work out.

At all.

But I had some crust leftover and wanted to use it for something, hence the gluten and sugar free miniature chocolate pudding pie was born.


 So... apparently there's a reason you don't see many sugar-free lemon meringue pie recipes.  Maybe it's my total inexperience with lemon meringue pies, but I tried using stevia instead of sugar and while the meringue part turned out quite nicely, the lemon part was really kind of wretched.

The texture was really off - kind of creamy-like (it's possible this is because I used arrowroot starch instead of corn starch?), and the flavour was too tangy (stevia's fine in small amounts, not so much in larger amounts).

Ergh.  It was sad because it actually looked pretty good.

Sugar-free lemon meringue pie, lookin' good but tastin' yucky

So the upside of this experiment was that I had some leftover pie dough.  It wasn't enough to make another pie, so I decided to try and make some tart-like things.  But I didn't have mini tart pans.

Wondering how to make tarts without tart pans? 

I rolled out what was left of my dough, used the rim of a large glass to cut out the circles, then draped the circles over the underside of a muffin tin.  Like so:

Making miniature tarts / pies without a tart mold

Then baked them for a few minutes and voila!  Mini pie / tartlette shells! 

Then I made some super quick chocolate pudding in the microwave (yep, I went there.  For those of you worried about microwaves, you can do this on the stove like regular pudding.  I was tired of the kitchen and a little sad about my meringue.  Not in the mood to stand over the stove another 10 minutes!) and poured it into my shells.

They turned out wonderful.  So good, you'll notice, that although I started out with 7 shells, you'll only find 4 pies in the photo below.  The other three made their way into our bellies pretty quick ;) 

So here's the really good thing about these - aside from the fact that they're pretty much allergy free - they're a great way to use up leftover dough.  If you have the room in your freezer, you could easily store a muffin tin in there (wrapped up in some foil or a container), and periodically drape leftover dough on top until you end up with a full tin.

In this case, I had enough for seven little tartlettes/pies, and wanted them right away, so the pudding recipe here is sufficient to fill 7 little cups.  If you have more or less dough adjust the pudding accordingly. 

Ingredients:

Dough

Leftover dough from my Gluten Free Pie Dough as explained in my post on Miniature Apple Pies (or gluten free pie dough of choice)
Rice flour for dusting

Microwaved Chocolate Pudding (makes enough for 7 tartlettes/pies)

2.5 Tbsp honey or stevia equal to 1/4 cup sugar
3 Tbsp cocoa powder
2 Tbsp arrowroot starch (can sub cornstarch for a cheaper option)
1c milk of choice (regular, rice, almond, etc)
1 tsp vanilla extract
pinch of salt

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350F.

1. To make the tartlette shells: Wrap leftover dough in a sheet of waxed paper and refrigerate for 20-30 minutes, until chilled.  Sprinkle a sheet of waxed paper with rice flour, add dough and sprinkle with more flour.  Then, add another sheet of waxed paper and roll out dough with a rolling pin until 1/4" thick.

2. To shape the tartlettes: Using the rim a glass larger than the bottom of your muffin tin, cut out  circles from your dough.  Continue to re-roll and cut out the dough as necessary.  I shaped the last tiny bit of dough by hand.  Turn your muffin tin upside down, spray with a light film of oil and drape dough circles over the bottom of the tin. Lightly poke a couple of rows of holes in the top of the dough with a fork, for ventilation. 

Bake for 10 minutes, until the dough hardens. 

3.  To make the pudding: In a microwave safe bowl, whisk together the cocoa, starch and salt.  Then whisk in the milk and little bit at a time to avoid clumps.  Add in the honey.

4. Microwave the pudding for 2 minutes on high, stir, then cook in 30 second increments, stirring and heating until the pudding becomes shiny and thick. Add in the vanilla. 

5.  Divide the pudding into the dough cups and chill until pudding is cool and thick.   Serve chilled and enjoy!

What do you do with your leftover pie dough?

This post was shared on the following great link parties: Waste Not Want Not Wednesday,  Musings of a Housewife, My Meatless Mondays, Melt in Your Mouth Monday, Monday Mania, Natural Living Monday, Slightly Indulgent Tuesday, Traditional Tuesday, Fat Tuesday, Gluten Free Wednesdays, Allergy Free Wednesdays, Whole Food Wednesdays, Wheat Free Wednesday, Foodie Friday, Fresh Bites Friday, Get Real Frugal Friday, Fight Back Friday, Gluten Free Fridays, Whole Food Fridays,