Pecan Plus Pie Pastry

Our answer

Nigella's Pecan-Plus Pie (from NIGELLA CHRISTMAS) has a shortcrust style crust with a sweet and sticky nut-studded filling. The pastry itself is really easy to make and does not requires rolling. It is a mixture of flour, salt, vegetable oil and milk. The soft dough is pressed into place in the tart tin and then quickly chilled in the freezer before baking.

If you wish to use store-bought pastry dough then we would suggest using a shortcrust pastry. Puff pastry is not suitable for this type of tart and sweet shortcrust pastry is too sweet and fragile for the pie filling. If buying pastry then please bear in mind that the tin has a 25cm/10-inch diameter with fairly deep sides, so a pack of ready rolled pastry (usually 375g) may not be quite large enough. We would suggest looking for a 500g block of pastry instead. As a block will need rolling out, we would emphasise that the crust in the recipe is actually very easy to make and press into the tin.