It began innocently when I was doing my house-girlfriend duties yesterday morning – the dishes. I was cleaning one of my antique pie plates. I had bought a set of three; all detailing different recipies on the bottom of each dish. Quite cute, plus, they’re massive plates so they come in really handy.
So, getting to my story, while I was washing one particular dish, the recipe on the plate finally got to me. The particular recipe was for lemon meringue pie. I had never made lemon meringue before so I thought, why not.
Be warned: have about 2 hours to dedicate to this recipe. It took a while to make, since the center is lemon curd, and that takes some time on the stove top. Also, it demands your attention, so plan to make this tasty treat when you don’t have anything going on on the side that may distract you. It is worth it.
I was really pleased with how it turned out. The meringue was perfectly set and brown on top, although the curd was a touch runny / not completely set, so we referred to it as our lemon meringue soup for the evening {be stingy with the water at the beginning}. There’s always next time.
A word of warning: don’t go overboard with the lemon. Less is more in the case of this recipe.
I made a plain pastry for the base and blind baked it before adding the lemon curd. No specific recipe was used for the pastry – just straight forward. Nothing fancy.
If you’re interested, see below for the recipe from inside the dish …
Ingredients
1.5 cups of sugar
2 tablespoons of cornstarch
1 cup of water {be stingy with this bit!!!}
3 beaten egg yolks
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel
2 tablespoons of butter
0.5 cup of lemon juice
9″ baked pastry shell
3 egg whites
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
6 tablespoons of sugar
Method
Mix first three ingredients on saucepan, stirring in water. Bring to the boil over medium heat, stirring until thick for about 5 minutes. Remove from heat; stir small amount of hot mixture into the egg yolks, then return to hot mixture. Bring to the boil and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Add lemon peel and butter. Slowly stir in 0.5 cup of lemon juice. Cool to lukewarm, stirring frequently. Pour into cooled pastry shell.
Beat egg whites with 1 teaspoon of lemon juice to soft peaks. Gradually add 6 tablespoons of sugar, beating until stiff peaks form. Spread over filling, sealing to edges of the pastry shell. Bake in oven at 200 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes. Cool before serving.
Click here for a handy cooking calculator, should you prefer to measure in cups, mls, oz etc.
Om nom nom nom om nom nom.