Cream Cheese Pumpkin Pie

Pre-Bake the Crust:

1. Preheat oven to 375F.
2. Place pie crust into prepared pie plate, pressing sides down firmly and crimping edges if desired. Make sure crust comes quite far up the sides or the filling won’t all fit. Prick holes with a fork into the crust for steam to escape in about one dozen places.
3. Bake for about 8 to 10 minutes or until light golden brown. While crust bakes, prepare the filling.

Make the Filling:

1. To the mixing bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment (or large bowl and electric mixer), add the sugar, flour, cream cheese and beat on medium-high speed until smooth, about 2 minutes. Reserve a heaping 1/2 cup in medium bowl; set aside.
2. To the large bowl with the cream cheese and sugar mixture, add the eggs, pumpkin puree, pumpkin pie spice, vanilla, salt, and beat on medium-high speed until smooth, about 2 to 3 minutes, scraping the sides of the bowl as necessary. 
3. Turn filling out into prepared crust, smoothing the top lightly with a spatula. I had about 1/3 cup of extra filling and since the exact dimensions of pie plates and exact thickness of crusts will vary, you may or may not have extra filling; set pie plate aside.
4. To the reserved cream cheese mixture, add the milk, and whisk vigorously to combine.
5. Turn the cream cheese mixture out over the pumpkin filling and spread lightly with a table knife or spatula. Cut through cream cheese and pumpkin with a knife or spatula in S-shaped curves in one continuous motion for a marbled design. Turn pie plate one-fourth turn and repeat.
6. Bake about 45 minutes or until center is set and not overly jiggly, and a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean or with a few moist crumbs but no batter. (The original recipe suggests covering the edge of crust with 3-inch strips of aluminum foil to prevent excessive browning and to remove foil for last 15 minutes of baking but since my filling came up nearly as high as the crust, I didn’t bother with foil and the crust wasn’t overly browned; do as you see fit.)
7. Cool pie on a wire rack for 30 minutes. Cover and refrigerate at least 4 hours before serving.