At this rate, I may have to rename this blog The Meyer Blog. I received a little bit of cash for Christmas and used part of of it to buy the meyer lemon tree that I had been wanting for some time. The tree has a very large fruit on it that is ripening nicely as well as several blooms and buds. I am not getting meyers at the farmers market right now but the upscale grocery store near me still has them.
I wanted to make a pie without using sweetened condensed milk so I did some research online and found a recipe that I modified. It was really, really good so I thought I'd share it.
Of course, you will need a prebaked pie crust. You can use your own recipe for it. Mine has vinegar and egg in it. I'll post it if anyone wants it.
Ingredients:
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup water
3/4 cup water
1/3 to 1/2 cup meyer lemon juice. (The meyers I have been getting are huge so I used the juice of one and it was at least this much.)
Zest from one lemon
3 eggs, separated
Beat the egg yolks and set them aside.
In a sauce pan, combine sugar, flour and salt, Make sure to mix them thoroughly before adding 1/4 cup water. Mix until the sugar is pretty much dissolved and make sure there are no lumps in the flour. Add the 3/4 cup of water and bring the mixture to a boil stirring constantly. Continue to cook and stir for about 5 minutes at which time the mixture will be thick and slightly brown indicating that the flour has been cooked. I used a whisk to do the stirring and kept it moving pretty fast.
Temper the eggs by adding some of the hot mixture in the pan to them. I do this by dipping out what my whisk will hold and whisking it into the eggs. Doing this twice should bring the eggs up to temp. Then, add the eggs to the hot mixture in the pan and cook it another two to three minutes.
Remove the pan from the burner and add the lemon juice and zest while continuing to whisk it vigorously until it is all combined and smooth. Let the filling cool a little before pouring it into the pie shell.
After it has completely cooled, beat the whites until stiff, add 1 or 2 tbsp sugar. Beat very well at very high speed. You can use cream of tarter if you want. Spread the egg whites onto the cooled pie being sure to bring them all the way to the edge and touch the crust all the way around. Bake at 300 degrees until the white is brown. I saved a little bit of the zest to sprinkle on top of the meringue.
The most difficult part of this process is letting the pie cool completely before you cut into it.
Sound track for this post: Peter, Paul and Mary's Lemon Tree.
(also recorded by Bobby Bare, Trini Lopez, the Brothers Four... but not Fool's Garden.)
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3 comments:
yes, waiting for something like that to cool is decidedly difficult.
Am I too late to the table?
Hello from Magnolia, TX. Ever since I was a teen, my sister and I always looked forward to going to the valley to visit family because we knew they had Valley lemons. And we LOVE Valley lemons. I've always heard that Texas A&M created these in a lab. Know I find on the internet that these orignated in China a long time ago. Hmmm.
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