Ingredients:
2 sheets of sweet short pastry
125g gingernut biscuits 
35g almonds
750g kumara, orange or gold
50g butter, diced
1 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ginger
85g brown sugar
3 eggs
maple syrup
250ml cream
1 tsp vanilla
METHOD:
Pre-heat oven to 190°C.
Grease a pie dish and line with the sweet short pastry, refrigerate for 60 mins.
Peel and chop the kumara into 3 cm pieces, lay out on a baking paper lined roasting tray.
Sprinkle the kumara with the spices.
Spread the diced butter around the pieces of kumara and drizzle the kumara with maple syrup.
Cover the roasting tray with tin foil, bake for 30 mins until the kumara is soft, the maple syrup and butter will form a caramel on the base of the lined tray.
While the kumara is roasting, blitz the almonds and gingernut biscuits in a food processor to form a fine crumb.
Remove the baked kumara from the oven and allow to cool.
Take the chilled pastry case, gently press a layer of the gingernut and almond crumb into the base of the pastry, you will use around ½ crumb, reserve the rest to go on the top of the cooked pie. Blind bake the pastry case for 10 mins at 190°C. 
Purée the cooled kumara, be sure to scrape all the sweet bits from the baking paper into the purée. If you need a little extra liquid for your blended to create a smooth purée, use a little of the cream.
In a large bowl, whisk the eggs, cream, vanilla essence, and brown sugar.
Stir the kumara purée through the egg mixture, until you have a smooth consistent pie filling.
Pour the kumara filling into the blind-baked pastry in your pie dish. Reduce the temp of your oven to 160°C and bake the pie for 45-50 mins, until the filling is firm. Cool.
Decorate the pie, with whipped cream and you may like to add small star cookies to celebrate the stars of Matariki.