Ingredients
Crust
1 cup of butter flavor Crisco
2 cups of flour
2 teaspoon salt
10 tablespoons ice cold water
Vanilla Filling
1 cup sugar
¼ cup cornstarch
4 egg yolks
2 ½ cup half & half
2 t vanilla
2 T butter
Hot Milk Sponge Cake
1 ½ cup AP Flour
1 ½ t baking powder
¾ t salt
¾ cup whole milk
6 T. butter
2 t. vanilla
1 ½ cup sugar
Chocolate Sauce
8 ounces semisweet chocolate
¾ cup heavy cream
2 T. light corn syrup
1 t. vanilla
Topping
1 cup heavy cream – whipped stiff with ¼ cup of powdered sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla
Grated chocolate
Extras
1 ½ cups of seedless jelly – your choice (I use either raspberry or cherry)
Directions
Crust
Preheat oven to 400. Whisk the flour and the salt together in a large bowl. Add the Butter Crisco and mix with your fingers until combined. Add the ice water and use a fork to combine. Turn pie dough out onto a floured surface and gather into a circular disk. Roll out the dough big enough to fit into a pie plate. Flute edges for decoration. Bake crust until edges are golden brown and bottom is browned also, about 15-20 minutes. Cool on a wire rack and set aside.
Vanilla Filling
Combine the sugar, cornstarch, egg yolks, and half & half together in a heavy saucepan. Cook until filling is thick and bubbly, about 4-5 minutes over medium-high heat. Having a heavy sauce pan is critical in not scorching your filling. Remove thickened filling and run it through a fine mesh sieve, catching strained filling in another bowl. Add the butter and vanilla and stir until melted and combined. Place plastic wrap directly on top of filling and set aside to cool, about 15 minutes.
Hot Milk Sponge Cake
Heat oven to 325 degrees. Grease 2 nine inch cake pans and line with parchment paper. Grease the parchment. Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl. Heat the milk and butter in a pan until butter is melted. Remove from heat and add the vanilla. Cover to keep warm. With a mixer, whip the eggs and sugar on high speed for about 5 minutes. Once mixed, add the hot milk mixture and whisk by hand until incorporated. Add the dry ingredients and mix until incorporated. Divide the batter between the two prepared pans and bake for about 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool cakes in pan. When cool, run a small knife around the edge of pan and turn out onto a wire rack. Remove parchment and turn cakes right side up. (You will only need one cake for this recipe, so enjoy the other cake for something else.)
Take one of the cooled cakes and trim it so it can fit in the pie crust. You may have to trim around the edge so it will fit nicely in the crust. Once you have the correct fit, carefully cut the cake in half horizontally so that you have 2 even cake layers. Place about ¾ cup of the cream filling over the bottom of the pie crust. Place one of the cake layers on the cream filling, cut side up. Spread ¾ cup of jelly on the cake layer. Cover the jelly with the rest of the cream filling. Carefully spread the rest of the jelly on the cut side of the other cake layer and place on the cream filling, jelly side down. Place cake in refrigerator for about 10 minutes, Meanwhile, combine all the ingredients for the chocolate sauce in a microwaveable bowl and cook for about 1 minute. Remove from microwave and stir until combined. Let cool for about 10 minutes. Once the cake is cool, carefully poor chocolate over the top of the cake until cake is covered. Place back in refrigerator for about an hour to let filling and chocolate set up. Garnish the top of cake with whipped cream in a decorative pattern and grate chocolate on top.