Impress Your Guests With This Classic Lemon Meringue Pie
This lemon meringue pie recipe uses both lemon zest and juice to strike the perfect balance between sweet and tart, plus it has a showstopping meringue topping.
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00:00Hi, it's Mackenzie in the Delish Kitchen studios, and if you are a little bit shy or intimidated
00:05with making a pie, I think a lemon meringue pie is a great one to start with.
00:10With a berry or like an apple pie, you never know for sure how it's going to turn out,
00:15but with the lemon meringue one, we already know that lemon curd is set, it's cooked,
00:20your meringue is beautiful, and you know it's going to slice beautifully.
00:23Our pie needs to start with a pie crust.
00:25I have one already made for us, our recipe on delish.com.
00:28You can use any of your favorite pie crust recipes.
00:31You can also use a frozen one if you prefer.
00:34I don't typically recommend that, but if you're already making the components for the rest
00:38of your lemon meringue pie and want to skip that step, you can.
00:41So first step for rolling out our pie crust, just flour your work surface a little bit.
00:46You don't need a lot, just that much, and then I like to do a little bit more on top,
00:51and just start rolling out your pie crust.
00:54If it feels too cold, give it a few minutes, let it warm up just a little bit.
00:59If it starts cracking along the edges, that's when you know your pie crust is too cold.
01:02But we're using a 9-inch pie plate, so we want to roll this out to about a 12-inch circle.
01:07I always recommend rolling away from you instead of coming back towards you.
01:13Always just roll away and rotate your circle around.
01:18And one way I like to measure to make sure it's big enough is I just put my pie plate
01:22upside down on it.
01:23It seems like I could go just a little bit further around, but these sides are looking
01:26good.
01:28Now for my pie crust, I like to roll it up on my rolling pin.
01:32This is just a little bit safer, that way you don't, like, stretch and tear your pie
01:38crust.
01:39Lift it up, and then roll it back out.
01:44And then very gently, without, like, stretching it again, press it down, kind of let it fall
01:50down to the sides of your pie plate, just like this.
01:54Before you crimp the edge of your crust, you just want to trim these edges to about half
01:59of an inch.
02:00I like to use scissors.
02:01You can also use a paring knife.
02:02Just go all the way around your crust, then fold under that little excess part so that
02:08it's flush with the edge of your pie plate, and then you can crimp.
02:12I like to do just kind of a classic crimp by taking my knuckle of my left hand and then
02:18my thumb and my pointer finger of my right and pinching it together all the way around.
02:24Now this needs to go in your refrigerator for at least 30 minutes so it gets nice and
02:28cold before going in the oven.
02:30Since the filling for our pie is already fully cooked, we are going to blind bake this crust
02:34so that when it comes out of the oven, it's already done and nice and golden.
02:38Before we bake it, we want to dock the bottom of our pie, just with a fork, pressing it
02:43in.
02:44This is going to help it not puff up while it bakes.
02:46We're going to line the bottom of our pie crust with parchment, and then fill it full
02:55with pie weights.
02:56You can use rice, dried beans, sugar, anything that's nice and heavy can go in the center.
03:06I like to use a sheet tray when I'm baking my pie crust.
03:10It does help the bottom cook through, but it also gives you something else to grab onto
03:14besides your pie crust, and you don't risk...
03:17I always put my thumb into it, and then I get really sad.
03:19So now I can grab the sheet tray out of the oven and make it easier for myself.
03:23We'll bake this at 375 degrees for about 30 minutes with the pie weights in.
03:27We're going to separate our eggs.
03:28To do this, just crack your egg open, and then I pass the yolk back and forth between
03:33the shell, letting that egg white fall out until it's separated.
03:38You can use the edge of your shell to cut that white if it's really finicky and it doesn't
03:42want to fall out.
03:43One reason I really love a lemon meringue pie is that you get to use both the egg whites
03:48and the egg yolks.
03:49I feel like oftentimes if you're making a meringue, you have leftover yolks that you
03:52don't know what to do with them.
03:54Same for a curd.
03:55You end up with whites, but this will use all of our egg whites and our egg yolks.
03:59For our meringue, add your egg whites into the bowl of a stand mixer.
04:02You can also use a hand mixer if you prefer, along with your cream of tartar, and start
04:06mixing that on a medium speed just until it starts to get a little frothy and foamy and
04:11starts to have a little bit of a shape to it.
04:14So as you add your sugar in, you want to do it very slowly, about a tablespoon at a time,
04:19just kind of shaking in your sugar.
04:21This will just help make sure your meringue is not grainy and gritty and nice and smooth,
04:26and that sugar doesn't just stay in one spot.
04:29Then just let this continue to beat until you have nice, stiff peaks, which means when
04:33you hold up your whisk that that peak should not fall over at all and will stand up nice
04:37and tall.
04:38If you're a little bit intimidated by a meringue or if you've never made one before, I think
04:42this is a really good one to start with.
04:44This is a French-style meringue, which means we are not cooking it while we're making it,
04:48and we'll cook it later on top of our pie.
04:51But a lot of other meringues require you to make, like, a sugar syrup or cook it over
04:56the stove while you're whisking it, but this one is just a little more straightforward
05:00and easier to work with.
05:02Our crust edges are nice and golden, but we need the bottom to cook through as well, so
05:06we're going to remove our pie weights and then bake again.
05:08Let's do this very carefully.
05:12So now this goes back into the oven until the bottom is fully cooked through for another
05:16five to ten minutes.
05:19The final component for our pie is the lemon curd, which is the star of the show.
05:23It's our main filling.
05:25So to make it, we are going to add our sugar, cornstarch, flour, a little bit of salt to
05:31our saucepan, and then slowly whisk in water.
05:35This is just making sure this filling is nice and smooth and not lumpy.
05:40Then let that come to a boil and let it boil for about one minute.
05:43We're going to temper our egg yolks by adding in just about a quarter of a cup of our sugar
05:49mixture while whisking very slowly, and then we can add the rest of that egg mixture back
05:55into our sugar mixture.
05:57Continue and let that cook for about a minute more.
06:01Off the heat, we're going to add the zest of two lemons and the juice of both lemons
06:06and some butter.
06:07The butter is the best part of a lemon curd.
06:10That's what makes it just like a velvety, silky texture and makes it really shiny and
06:14beautiful.
06:15We can now finally assemble our pie.
06:19So first we're going to add in all of that lemon curd and then top it off with the meringue.
06:24You can make as many like fun swoops and peaks with this meringue as you want.
06:29It's very important that your curd is still warm when you add your meringue on top because
06:35that heat is going to help these two layers seal together.
06:38Make sure your meringue gets all the way to the crust and then we'll pop it into the oven.
06:43This goes back into the oven just to toast this meringue at 350 degrees for about 10
06:48to 15 minutes.
06:49Start watching it closely after that 10 minutes.
06:54There she is.
06:55She's all beautiful and toasted, but sadly does have to go into the refrigerator to cool
07:00and set for a minimum of three hours and you can leave it in there up to overnight.
07:09I am so excited to finally try this pie.
07:12It just looks so beautiful.
07:13I love the layers of a lemon meringue pie.
07:16Oh my gosh.
07:18Yes, this is the perfect combo between like the tartness of like the lemon layer.
07:24I love a lemon dessert.
07:25It really is one of my favorites, but then like the sweetness of like the toasted meringue
07:28that gets a little bit like crunchy on top after being toasted.
07:32It's just the perfect combo.
07:33I don't think you can beat it.
07:35And despite like there being like multiple components to this pie, each one is like so
07:39easy to make and not that complicated or complex.
07:43I love lemon desserts just like this pie.
07:46So for more citrus desserts just like it for the spring and summer, stick around here
07:50at delish.com.