My creative process is a little...messy. It's completely the opposite of the rest of my life which is precisely planned with a series of lists and Excel spreadsheets. My most recent, messy creation: Coconut Mocha Pie.
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This Coconut Mocha Pie has a toasted coconut pastry crust filled with dark chocolate custard, topped with dalgona coffee swirled with whipped coconut cream! It's toasted coconut meets a mochaccino and I am HERE for it!!
I used desiccated (dried) coconut in the crust, as I didn’t want the texture or the added sweetness of regular sweetened coconut. If you can’t find desiccated coconut, you can find it here.
I've included instructions on toasting the coconut in the recipe. Because the coconut is dried, it toasts up in a flash, so really keep an eye on it!
While a pastry blender isn’t necessary to cut in the shortening, it does make the job a lot faster and easier. If you’re looking to buy one for yourself, you can find one here.
Pie weights help when blind-baking the crust, keeping the dough from rising/getting bubbles as it bakes. This makes sure that you have the room that you need for filling. You can buy actual pie weights if you’d like (like these here), but I just use black beans. They’re cheap and you can use them over and over again.
I use both my faves, chocolate extract and vanilla bean paste, in this recipe. The chocolate extract lends amazing depth of flavor to the chocolate custard! If you can’t find it in your local grocery store, you can find some here. Even better, make yourself some Homemade Chocolate Extract for next time!
I love the flavor of vanilla bean paste, so I couldn't resist adding some to the whipped coconut cream! If you’d like to get some vanilla bean paste for yourself, you can find some here. If you’d rather substitute, you can use an equal measure of vanilla extract.
For the topping, both the dalgona coffee and the whipped coconut cream are easy to whip up, but neither are particularly stable. You'll want to wait to top the pie until not too long before you serve it. The whipped coconut cream can be hit-or-miss depending on the quality of your coconut milk (or coconut cream). I've included helpful hints in the recipe to help ensure success!
So while it feels like I'm a crazy person when I'm inventing a new bake off the cuff, I am vindicated when I take my first bite! The flaky crust and the rich, sweet custard with the foamy, creamy, sweet-and-strong toppings makes me want to do it all over again. 🙂
Other posts you may like:
Mocha Tart
Coconut Macadamia Cookies
Mocha Sweet Rolls
Mocha Swirl Cookies
Custard adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Baking From My Home to Yours (link here).
Coconut Mocha Pie
Ingredients
Toasted Coconut Pie Crust:
- 1½ cups flour
- ½ cup dried (desiccated) coconut, toasted (see note)
- 10 tablespoon vegetable shortening
- 1 egg
- 3 tablespoon water, cold
- 1 tablespoon white vinegar
Dark Chocolate Custard:
- 3 cups whole milk
- 6 egg yolks
- ⅔ cup sugar
- ¼ cup cornstarch
- pinch salt
- 10 oz bittersweet chocolate (I used 60% cacao)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon chocolate extract (see note)
- 3 tablespoon unsalted butter, diced and at room temperature
Dalgona Coffee:
- ¼ cup instant coffee
- ¼ cup sugar
- ¼ cup boiling water
Whipped Coconut Cream:
- 14 oz coconut milk or coconut cream, cold (I chilled mine overnight)
- ½ cup powdered sugar, sifted
- 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste (see note)
Instructions
For Crust:
- Preheat oven to 375° F. In a medium bowl, combine the flour and vegetable shortening. Using a pastry blender (see note) or fork, cut shortening in until no large pieces remain. Stir in the toasted coconut (see note).
- In a small bowl, combine egg, cold water, and vinegar. Whisk to combine.
- Make wells in the flour mixture, and pour the egg mixture into the wells. Stir until a soft dough is formed. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead slightly into a ball.
- Roll dough to fit your pie plate, ensuring that you don't stretch the dough (as this may cause it to shrink when baked). Line the pie crust will foil and fill with pie weights (see note).
- Bake 20 minutes. Remove the foil and pie weights and bake an additional 5-8 minutes, or until the crust looks dry and is barely golden. Allow crust to cool completely on a wire rack.
For Custard:
- In a medium saucepan, heat milk to just boiling.
- While the milk warms, combine egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch, and salt in a medium heatproof bowl. Whisk until thoroughly combined.
- Once the milk is boiling, add about ½ cup of the hot milk in a slow, steady stream to the egg mixture while whisking constantly. This will temper the eggs. Then add the egg mixture to the saucepan with the remaining milk.
- Cook mixture over medium heat, whisking constantly, until mixture is thick. Once the desired thickness is reached, remove from the heat.
- Add melted chocolate and mix to combine. Add vanilla extract, chocolate extract (see note), and butter and mix to incorporate.
- Strain the mixture through a fine mesh sieve into another bowl to ensure there are no lumps in the custard. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly to the surface of the custard to ensure it doesn't form a skin. Refrigerate until chilled through, at least one hour.
For Dalgona Coffee:
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all dalgona coffee ingredients. Using the whisk attachment, whip on high speed until the mixture forms soft peaks.
For Coconut Cream:
- Scoop just the white, solid portion of the chilled can of coconut milk (or cream) into the bowl of a stand mixer (leaving the clear liquid behind). Using the whisk attachment, beat on high speed until thick.
- Sift the powdered sugar into the bowl, and continue whipping on high speed until peaks form. Add vanilla bean paste (see note) and mix to combine. It may take 4-5 minutes for the cream to whip to peaks. If it appears lumpy, add a bit of the clear liquid from the can to help thin it, and just keep beating! A high-quality coconut milk or cream will whip up the best!
Assembly:
- Fill cooled pie crust with the chilled dark chocolate custard. Top with the dalgona coffee, then drop spoonfuls of the whipped coconut cream on top and swirl together. I added grated chocolate for garnish. Note that neither the dalgona coffee nor the coconut cream are very stable, so you'll want to make them/top the pie with them as close to serving time as possible!Enjoy!
SkylaR
Best flavors ever! My boyfriend doesn't like coconut, so this is all for me! 😀
Amee
Hahaha my husband won't eat coconut, either. More for us! Thanks for your review! <3