Chocolate Walnut Pie

When my grandmother was still living, we would eat at her house most Sundays. She liked to spoil the kids a bit (understatement) and often made or brought home yummy desserts for our Sunday get together. The top favorite was something called Dixie Pie, made by Tippin's and sold at her local grocery store. It was a walnut pie with chocolate in it. For Thanksgiving, I sought to reproduce the Dixie Pie using a combination of my own pecan pie recipe and some ideas I gleaned from other recipes. The Thanksgiving pie was good, but not great. I made some adjustments at Christmas and this one was a winner. Biggest tip?! Use fresh walnuts! The flavor really comes through in this pie so it is NOT the place to use up old slightly rancid or freezer burned nuts.

Chocolate Walnut Pie

1 pie crust (okay, I cheat here and use Pillsbury even though I have a great lard crust recipe)
3 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup Karo syrup
1/2 cup sugar
2 Tbl butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup chocolate chips (I use Ghirardelli)
1 1/2 cup walnuts, chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

If using refrigerated pre-prepared pie crust, let it come to room temperature. Roll out the crust, lightly flour and place into a 9" pie plate (i.e. slide your hand underneath, invert the pie plate on top then flip). Crimp the edges as you like. If you are making your own crust, you go for it! You probably already know what you are doing.

Stir eggs, syrup, sugar, butter and vanilla until well blended. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts. Pour into pie crust. Bake for 45 minutes. The pie will not look entirely set after 45 minutes but the heat of the sugar will finish up the cooking once you remove it from the oven. Cool on a wire rack. Enjoy! Yum!