23 Pie Recipes That Don’t Involve Rolling Out Pie Dough
Don’t know what to do with all those potato peels? Running out of room in your oven for stuffing? Gravy tasting a little flat? Head to our holiday hub, How to Thanksgiving Smarter, Not Harder, for everything you need to know—and nothing you don't—to make this year's holiday easier, speedier, and tastier.
While golden, flaky, impeccably prepared pie crust has its place, these 23 recipes are for the time-savers, the procrastinators, and the impatient. Just because you don’t want to make from-scratch pastry doesn’t mean you should have to compromise on taste or flavor. From press-in pie crusts that rely on graham crackers, cookies, and wildcards like pretzels and saltines, to no-bake frozen pies that will give your oven a break, you can have your pie and eat it too.
Photograph by Rana Duzyol, Food Styling by Jesse Szewczyk, Prop Styling by Marina Bevilacqua1/23Cinnamon Crunch Crinkle Pie
Photograph by Rana Duzyol, Food Styling by Jesse Szewczyk, Prop Styling by Marina Bevilacqua2/23Salted Coffee Custard Pie
Laura Murray3/23BA’s Best Coconut Cream Pie
Think of this cream pie recipe from pastry chef and former BA staffer Claire Saffitz as a giant, slicable Samoa cookie. It’s crunchy, caramelly, creamy, and positively jam-packed with coconut in all its many forms.
Photograph by Rana Duzyol, Food Styling by Jesse Szewczyk, Prop Styling by Marina Bevilacqua4/23Hazelnut Butter Cup Tart
Photograph by Rana Duzyol, Food Styling by Jesse Szewczyk, Prop Styling by Marina Bevilacqua5/23Easy-Fancy Pear Galette
This may look and sound fancy, but as the name promises, it’s unbelievably easy. We simplify your life by calling for canned pears—a trick borrowed from French patisseries and their elaborate pear tarts. You won’t have to fuss with a pie crust either; store-bought puff pastry will do just fine.
Photo by Emma Fishman, food styling by D'mytrek Brown6/23Pumpkin-Tahini Mousse Pie
This cloudlike version of pumpkin pie uses earthy tahini for extra nutty flavor. The trick to keeping it so light is mixing the pumpkin-tahini base with whipped cream in two additions: The first half ensures that the mixture is well-combined, while the second half is ever so gently folded in to maintain its airiness.
Photo by Emma Fishman, food styling by D'Myrtrek Brown7/23Chocolate-Biscoff Banoffee Pie
This pie is a combination of chocolate, bananas, and butterscotch, but it isn’t your traditional British banoffee pie. Mallory Cayon, of Sunday Hospitality in NYC and LA, uses crisp speculoos cookies in the crust to add just a hint of spice and bitter chocolate to contrast with the caramelly butterscotch filling.
Photo by Ted + Chelsea Cavanaugh, food styling by Rebecca Jurkevich, prop styling by Kalen Kaminski8/23Banana Cream Pie
Trust us when we say that everything that makes this recipe impressive is actually what makes it so easy to pull off. From the salty-sweet graham cracker crust to the sky-high mountain of peanut-studded whipped cream to the yolk-yellow filling bursting with natural banana flavor, you’d be fooling yourself—and your guests—if you thought it was hard to make.
Photograph by Rana Duzyol, Food Styling by Jesse Szewczyk, Prop Styling by Marina Bevilacqua9/23Triple Citrus Creamsicle Pie
Photograph by Isa Zapata, Food Styling by Taneka Morris, Prop Styling by Maya Rossi11/23Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie
Photograph by Isa Zapata, Food Styling by Pearl Jones, Prop Styling by Dayna Seman13/23Guava and Goat Cheese Phyllo Pie
Photo by Alex Lau, food styling by Susie Theodorou, prop styling by Elizabeth Jaime14/23Chocolate Ganache Tart
Photograph by Emma Fishman, food styling by Susie Theodorou, prop styling by Aneta Florczyk16/23Ruffled Milk Pie With Raspberries
Photo by Alex Lau, food styling by Alison Attenborough, prop styling by Heather Greene22/23Coconut-Strawberry Ice Cream Pie
