Pumpkin Pie with Pumpkin Spice Graham Cracker Crust

Prepare Pumpkin Spice Graham Cracker Crust: Preheat oven to 300-degrees and spray a pie dish with baking spray and set aside. In a food processor, or using a heavy object, crush graham crackers until they are fine crumbs (I put the graham cracker sheets in a large ziplock bag and used a jar to crush the crackers into crumbs). Melt the butter in microwave in a medium sized bowl. Add the graham cracker crumbs, pumpkin pie spice and powdered sugar to the melted butter and mix until mixture resembles coarse sand. Press mixture into prepared pie dish, pressing firmly to the bottom of the dish and the sides. I used a metal measuring cup to firmly press the crumbs down.

Bake graham cracker crust in 300-degree oven for 8-minutes. Remove from oven and place on wire rack to cool, while you prepare your pie filling.

Prepare Pumpkin Pie Filling: Change oven temperature to 400-degrees, and let it rise to temperature while you make the pumpkin pie filling.

In a medium saucepan, on medium-high heat on the stovetop, add the pumpkin puree. Cook the puree, stirring regularly, for 15-minutes (or until pumpkin puree begins to darken and crystalize). Add brown sugar, salt, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon and nutmeg to the saucepan with the pumpkin puree. Continue to cook mixture on medium-high heat for two-minutes, stirring constantly.

Remove pot from heat and stir in the vanilla extract to the pumpkin mixture. Next, slowly add the (room temperature) heavy cream to the pumpkin mixture, stirring it in as you go. Slowly add the (room temperature) beaten eggs to the mixture and stir pumpkin mixture until completely smooth.

Pour mixture into graham cracker crust and bake in 400-degree oven for approximately 35-minutes.

Pumpkin pie is done when a tooth pick inserted in the middle comes out without raw pumpkin batter on it. When pumpkin pie is done baking, remove from oven and place on wire rack to cool. Let pie cool for approximately 2-hours. Once cool, loosely cover pie with plastic wrap and refrigerate until ready to eat.