Perfect Pumpkin Pie
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After more than 25 years of cooking professionally—and hosting plenty of Thanksgivings—I’ve made a lot of pumpkin pies. This is the one I make every year, and the one my family looks forward to most.
Pumpkin pie is a Thanksgiving classic, and when it’s made well, it’s hard to beat—a silky, warmly spiced pumpkin filling baked into a buttery, flaky crust. But for a dessert that seems so simple, pumpkin pie can be surprisingly finicky. Over the years, I’ve tried at least a dozen recipes and run into just about every issue: fillings that won’t set, unsightly cracks, and soggy crusts. Let’s just say the person who coined the phrase “easy as pie” had clearly never baked a pumpkin pie!
The good news is that all that testing paid off. This pumpkin pie recipe turns out beautifully, with a flaky crust, rich pumpkin filling, and smooth, crack-free top. And the best part? It’s truly easy to make.
If you’re planning your holiday dessert lineup, don’t miss my pecan pie, sweet potato pie, and apple pie—they’re all wonderful alongside this pumpkin pie.
“I’ve been baking pumpkin pie for what seems like an eternity. The custard always cracks. Not this time…it’s absolutely delicious!”
What You’ll Need To Make Homemade Pumpkin Pie
- Pie Crust: Use a homemade pie crust or store-bought—whichever you prefer. If using store-bought, opt for the frozen kind in an aluminum pie pan; it’s easier to blind bake and less likely to shrink.
- Pumpkin: For the best results, I recommend Libby’s canned pumpkin purée.
- Egg & Egg Yolks: The whole egg helps set the filling, while the extra yolks add richness and give it a silky texture.
- Granulated Sugar & Light Brown Sugar: Using both gives the filling a more complex sweetness, with a subtle molasses note from the brown sugar.
- All-Purpose Flour: Slightly thickens and stabilizes the filling, which helps prevent cracks.
- Spices (ground cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves & black pepper): This classic blend gives the pie its warm, spiced flavor, with just a hint of heat from the black pepper.
- Evaporated Milk: Gives the filling its rich, creamy texture without making it too heavy.
- Jump to the printable recipe for precise measurements
How To Make Pumpkin Pie
Blind bake the crust: If using a store-bought crust, follow the package directions for pre-baking the crust. For homemade dough, fit it into a deep-dish pie pan and chill it. Line the chilled crust with parchment, fill it with pie weights (or dried beans), and bake until the edges look set.
Remove the weights and bake a bit longer until the bottom looks dry and lightly golden. If the crust puffs up, gently press it back down with a flat spatula. Blind baking gives the crust a head start so it stays nice and crisp once the wet pumpkin filling is added.
Make the filling: Whisk the filling ingredients together until completely smooth, making sure there are no pockets of flour or spices. Pour the filling into the pre-baked crust.
Bake and serve: Bake the pie at 325°F so the custard cooks gently and evenly. It’s done when the filling looks set and dry around the edges but still has a slight jiggle in the center when you nudge the pan—don’t worry, it will continue to set as it cools. If the crust edges start to brown too much before the filling is done, loosely cover them with foil.
Let the pie cool completely before slicing. Serve at room temperature or chilled, with whipped cream if you like.
Make-Ahead Instructions
Pumpkin pie is ideal for making ahead. You can bake it a day before serving, let it cool completely, then cover and refrigerate it overnight. For longer storage, the baked pie can also be frozen; see the recipe card below for full freezing instructions.
Video Tutorial
More Holiday Desserts You’ll Love
Perfect Pumpkin Pie
Ingredients
- 1 homemade pie crust or 9-inch deep-dish frozen pie crust shell thawed
- 1 (15-oz) can pure pumpkin (about 1¾ cups)
- 1 large egg
- 3 large egg yolks
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup (packed) light brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ⅛ teaspoon ground cloves
- ⅛ teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1¼ cups evaporated milk (you'll need one 12-oz can but you won't use all of it)
Instructions
- Blind Bake the Crust: If you’re using a store-bought frozen crust, follow the pre-baking instructions on the package. If you’re using a homemade crust, roll out the dough and gently fit it into a 9-inch deep-dish pie pan, making sure it’s snug against the bottom and sides. Chill the crust for at least 30 minutes.Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 375°F and set an oven rack in the middle position. Place the chilled crust on a baking sheet (it makes it much easier to move in and out of the oven). Line the crust with a piece of parchment paper and fill it about three-quarters full with dried beans or pie weights.Bake for 20 minutes. Remove the crust from the oven, lift out the parchment and weights, and tent the edges with a few strips of foil folded in half lengthwise to keep them from getting too dark. Return the crust to the oven and bake for another 15 to 20 minutes, until the bottom looks dry and lightly golden. If it puffs up a bit, just press it down gently with a flat spatula—try not to puncture it. Remove the foil, but keep it nearby in case you need it again later.After blind-baking the crust, reduce the oven temperature to 325°F.
- Make the Filling: In a large bowl, combine the pumpkin, egg, egg yolks, granulated sugar, brown sugar, flour, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves, pepper, and evaporated milk. Whisk until smooth, then pour the filling into the pre-baked crust.
- Bake and cool: Bake the pie for 50 to 60 minutes (at 325°F), until the filling is just set. It should look dry around the edges, but the center should jiggle just slightly if you nudge the pan. Keep a close eye on the pie as it bakes; if ever the crust looks like it's browning too quickly, tent the edges with foil strips. Let the pie cool on a rack (leave it on the baking sheet) to room temperature, a few hours. Slice or refrigerate until ready to serve.
Notes
Nutrition Information
This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
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I’ve made a lot of pumpkin pies in my life and this one is honestly the best I’ve made. First, the crust. I usually make all-butter crusts and, although tasty, they often end up tough. I used lard in place of shortening (It’s what I had in my pantry and I don’t like to use hydrogenated shortening). It was a very unmanageable mess when I was rolling out the dough, so I was concerned. It ended up more like a pat-in-the-pan crust or pate sucre. But the end result…fabulous! Flavourful and tender! The filling was so delicious and no cracks! This will be my new go-to recipe! Thanks!
This was an amazing pie, one that I’ll now be baking often during the season. I didn’t have a food processor so I tried to use a hand blender. I didn’t get the crumbly texture, it was a smooth dough – but it still turned out amazing. Thank you!
Hi,
This by far THE best pumpkin pie recipe I’ve made! Wondering if you think I could substitute in some maple syrup somehow? Would love to add my son-in-law’s syrup to this!
So glad you like it, Sandra! I wouldn’t recommend incorporating maple syrup into the filling — sorry!
How about Maple whipped cream for serving?
Sounds like a great option! 🙂
Hi Jenn,
I love this recipe and have made it the past 2 years for Thanksgiving. I was just wondering what your thoughts are on using lard instead of shortening for the crust? Just wondering if one outperformed the other or if one was better for you over the other?
Hi Cathy, when I developed this recipe, I tried it with both lard and shortening. I found that I liked it better with shortening but it would be perfectly fine for you to swap the shortening out for lard if you’d prefer. Hope that helps!
I have tried multiple different recipes for pumpkin pie. This is the best recipe I ever made. I was short on time so I bought a store bought pie crust but I followed the advice to prebake the pie crust and it turned out 100% intact !!! This will be my ongoing recipe. Also I want to add the pie is not sweet. You really taste the pumpkin and its true spices. Everyone loved it.
Hi, could I change the crust to a graham cracker crust? If so, would I need to Pre-bake it some before the filling gets poured in? Btw, delicious very spiced pie! Unbelievable NO cracks!!
Hi Bri, A graham cracker crust would work here. Yes, you’ll still need to blind bake it but that initial bake time will definitely be a lot quicker than that of the pastry crust. I’d love to hear how it turns out!
I’m planning to try your recipe, and wondering if you or anyone else have used fresh puréed pumpkin, instead of canned??? Advice quickly as I plan to make in the next few days. Thanks
I’ll rate when done but it looks fabulous
Hi Bekka, A few readers have commented that they’ve used fresh pumpkin successfully, but I’ve never prepared it that way. Please LMK how it turns out if you try it!
Love pumpkin pie and can’t wait to make this with my children 🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡
I would like to change my rating to two stars, but I’m apparently not able to. The filling itself tasted OK, although we (wife and I) both noted that it tasted more like milk than pumpkin. The crust itself was SUPER hard, almost impossible to cut with a fork (required two hands and a good portion of my body weight). I honestly don’t understand why this recipe is rated so highly. I find it mediocre, with an emphasis on appearance over flavor.
I really want to try this recipe but I don’t have evaporated milk on hand. Can I substitute with milk and heavy cream? Thank you for all the great recipes!!
Hi Maryam, I haven’t tried it with anything but evaporated milk so I’m not sure it would bake up perfectly, but it’s worth a try. Please LMK how it turns out if you try it!
I did use milk and heavy cream, as I always did before. I did everything else as indicated, and it turned out OK, except that the pie did crack when cooling down. It looked perfect out of the oven, but the cracks appeared after a few minutes, and deepened. Could it be because I did not use evaporated milk?
Hi Anne, I haven’t tried this without evaporated milk, so I can’t say for sure, but I suspect that’s what caused the problem.
I wouldn’t say it was the perfect pie, but I did love it! I had a fun time making it, but I did run into some problems (maybe a fault of my own). I love the pictures and step by step instructions, those were helpful, thanks! At first, the pie crust really did crumble a lot and had to add extra water before it started to hold shape, but it tastes great anyway, so I can’t complain too much. For the pie filling, it could be my own taste, but i taste too much of the evaporated milk and also, the filling rose, a lot. By the end, it was an entire inch taller than it originally was, not sure why that was. Either way, great pie! 9/10 would make again!
I reviewed the “perfect pumpkin pie” last season as it was the best I have tasted. This review is to let your readers know how easy it is to make this pie and how it is successful each and every time. My 11 year old grandson (Roman) loves to cook and pumpkin pie is his favorite. Although he used a premade crust, he followed your filling recipe and made this pie for our dinner dessert. It was so delicious, light, creamy, with perfect blend of spices. So pumpkin Pie isn’t just for the fall. It is perfect on a summer night with whipped topping. You have a new follower now and he is maybe your youngest!?
So glad it’s a family favorite and I love that your 11-year-old grandson made it! 🙂
Way too much dough for a pie pan. Maybe mention you need a really deep pan before I make the whole thing.