Lemon Meringue Pie

This was delicious, we had a slight problem with meringue, because the electric whisk stopped working…

Again picture quality awful, due to sand in my camera lens…

This uses the double the pastry recipe from a few weeks ago on the blog (for a bigger pie).

Ingredients

For the lemon curd

• 2 level tbsp cornflour
• 100g caster sugar
• finely grated zest of 2 lemons
• 125ml fresh lemon juice (from 2 – 3 lemons)
• juice 1 small orange
• 85g dairy free butter (I used stork)
• 3 egg yolks and 1 whole egg

For the meringue

• 4 egg whites at room temperature
• 200g caster sugar (golden if you have it)
• 2 level tsp cornflour

Method

• Preheat oven to 180C
• Line pie tin with pastry, use a fork to prick the bottom, cover with foil and put baking beans on top, cook for 15 minutes. Take the baking beans out and the foil off and cook for another 6 minutes. Set aside. Turn the oven down to 160C.
• Put the cornflour, caster sugar and zest in a pan over a medium heat, slowly add in all of the lemon juice (strain it).
• Make the juice of the orange up to 200ml with water and strain into the pan.
• Cook over a medium heat, stirring constantly until thick and smooth. Once the mixture bubbles remove from the hear and beat in the butter until melted.
• Beat the 3 egg whites and whole egg together, stir into the pan and return to medium heat. Keep stirring until the mixture thickens and plops from the spoon (be careful not to scramble the egg). Take off the heat and set aside.
• Making the meringue, put the egg whites in the bowl and whisk until soft peaks form, then add the caster sugar a spoonful at the time continue whisking , when you have added half the sugar, add the cornflour, then add the remaining caster sugar a spoonful at a time (the mixture should me smooth and thick).
• Reheat the lemon curd filling and place in the pastry case, then add the meringue mixture on top, starting from the outside and spread it so it just touches the pastry and anchors it.
• Pile the rest in the middle spreading so that it touches the surface of the hot filling (and begins to cook), then give it a swirl to get a nice pattern on top.
• Return to the oven for 18 – 20 minutes. Take out of the oven, let the pie sit in the tin for 30 minutes and then let it cool for an hour before slicing.

Have Fun!