Sweet and Salty Guinness Chocolate Pie with Beer Marshmallow Meringue

I’m a huge fan of Guinness in desserts, so when St. Patrick’s day rolls around I try to find new ways to incorporate it into my baking.  This year I’ve made an old recipe new again!  Ever since I first tasted Guinness Chocolate Pudding, I thought it would be delicious as a pie filling.  It just took a few little tweaks to make it sturdy enough to slice.  I paired it with my own recipe for sweet-and-salty pretzel crust and topped it with a Guinness flavored marshmallow meringue. So, let’s recap.

• Sweet and salty pretzel crust
• Guinness-infused chocolate pudding pie filling
• Guinness marshmallow meringue –toasted

Comforting.  Delicious.  My very own beer/pretzel/chocolate/marshmallow dream come true.

This recipe makes two pies.  Show kindness to others.  Give a pie. ♥

3/19 – Notations have been added to this recipe.

Sweet and Salty Guinness Chocolate Pie with Beer Marshmallow Meringue

Yield: 2 pies                                                                                                      [click for printable recipe]

Pretzel crust:

2 cups crushed pretzels

1 cup graham cracker crumbs

10 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted

1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons light brown sugar (firmly packed)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a medium bowl, mix together pretzels, graham cracker crumbs, butter and brown sugar.  Stir together with a rubber spatula until well incorporated. 
3. Divide mixture between two 8 or 9-inch pie plates. Bake for 10 minutes.  Cool completely before filling.

Guinness chocolate filling:

8 large egg yolks

1 cup sugar

14.9 oz. can Guinness Draught, divided

2 1/4 cups heavy cream

7 oz. high quality bittersweet chocolate, evenly chopped

1/4 cup cornstarch

1. Whisk together egg yolks and sugar in a non-reactive bowl.
2. Pour 1 cup of Guinness in a heavy-bottomed 3-quart saucepan (reserve the rest for later use – no drinky!). Add heavy cream and whisk to combine.  Set over medium-high heat and cook until very hot but not boiling. Remove from heat and whisk in chocolate.   When chocolate has melted, whisk in the egg mixture in a very thin stream as to not scramble the egg.  Whisk in cornstarch and return to heat source.  Whisk over medium heat until thickened.
3. Divide mixture between pie pans.  Use a rubber spatula to effectively remove all the pudding from the saucepan; quickly smooth the chocolate into the crust.  Refrigerate while making the marshmallow topping.

Beer marshmallow topping:

Edit: 3/19 -Note: This marshmallow meringue is really gooey and not your average dry, fluffy meringue.  It’s more like melted marshmallow fluff. 

Edit: 1/23/13 – A few people who have made this say that they had bunches of meringue left over.  If you’re not a big fan of meringue or have shallow pie pans, then you may want to reduce the amount by 1/4 to 1/2.

Place the remaining Guinness in a small saucepan over medium heat and cook until reduced to 3 tablespoons.

2 cups sugar

4 egg whites

1/4 cup plus 2 tbsp. water

1/4 tsp salt

12 jumbo marshmallows (or about 18-20 large) cut into quarters with kitchen scissors

3 tbsp. beer reduction (as instructed above)

1. Whisk sugar, egg whites, water and salt together in a large metal bowl.  Set bowl over a simmering pan of water; whisk constantly until sugar dissolves and mixture is hot to the touch.  Remove bowl from simmering saucepan and stir in marshmallows pieces.  Let stand for 3-5 minutes until marshmallow pieces have softened. Return bowl to simmering water and beat together using a hand-held mixer.  Beat for several minutes until mixture thickens. Remove bowl from simmering water and add beer reduction. Continue to beat mixture until it has cooled slightly.
2. Preheat oven to broil.
3. Divide mixture between two pie pans and place under broiler in oven.  Watch constantly – it’s easy for the marshmallow to burn! Remove from oven when nice and toasty.
4. Refrigerate pies until well set – about 3-4 hours. Edit: 3/19 -this is important! This helps the meringue to solidify

Note:  Use a warm knife (dipped in hot water then wiped dry) to achieve cleanly cut slices of pie.  That marshmallow topping is sticky!