It’s Mr Satu’s birthday this week, and because I’ve become a little braver about baking in the last year or so, I asked him what sort of birthday cake he might want, if I was to make one. Hypothetically speaking.
His answer: Lemon meringue! From scratch! (I don’t know why he felt the need to stress that last part.)
Because his birthday is on Thursday, and I didn’t really want the stress of wrestling egg whites on a weekday evening, I made it on Saturday instead.
After extensive research[1], I settled on this recipe from Chaos in the Kitchen, because I really liked the picture and the instructions were reassuringly short. For the crust, though, I went with Zen Can Cook; I’ve never made a pie crust before, and I thought the meringue would be stressful enough without adding extra difficulty. So: crumbs, sugar, butter.
Before baking...
... and after. I think.
I substituted digestive biscuits for the graham crackers, and it turned out really crumbly; I don’t know if I just used too many of them or if there’s some difference in texture. Next time I might brave the pie crust!
The lemon curd was the fun bit — you stick everything in the pan, turn up the heat and, like magic, it turns into lovely yellow goo.
Goo!
And then finally, the meringue!
Pointy pie!
The egg whites went nice and fluffy and stiff on the first try. Even after I’d dropped a bowl in there while I was separating the eggs. I suspect I might not have whipped it for quite long enough, because the meringue went kind of droopy soon after it came out of the oven. (Edited to add: My wise friend Emmy informs me that this “usually means it cooled in a draft (or cooler place than it wanted to cool)”.)
Floppy pie.
The recipe said to chill the pie in the fridge overnight, but we couldn’t possibly wait that long. As soon as it was down to room temperature, I cut it open to peer inside. Mr Satu stood next to me, looking a little worried.
It had actually worked!
The layers weren’t really sticking together and the crust ended up crumbling everywhere so it resembled a trifle more than a pie, but it tasted really rather good[2], and Mr Satu was pleased with his cake[3].
Viola!
I’ll be making it again!
–
[1] Browsing Foodgawker for half an hour.
[2] I have just had another slice, almost 24 hours later, and it is now much more pie-like in its appearance.
[3] After the obligatory pretending-to-be-choking-to-death part.
[...] bottom layer was lime curd. I basically used this recipe, same as when I made the lemon meringue pie last year, except with lime instead of lemon. For some reason I’d expected it to be bright [...]