Homemade Lemon Meringue Pie. Old fashioned & scratch made!
Homemade Lemon Meringue Pie. If your lemon meringue pie comes from powder in a box, STOP! A fantastic homemade lemon meringue pie, made completely from scratch, tastes much better and is actually just as easy to prepare.
Originally published Oct, 2007
Here's one for the lemon lovers. Made completely from scratch, just like Grandma used to make. No artificial anything here! So much better than those artificial powder pretenders. Reminds me of Sunday suppers while growing up.
A homemade lemon meringue pie is a good reason to perfect your pastry making technique too. I always recommend that beginner bakers start with pastry pie shells before moving on to two crust filled pies.
You will get a better feel for working with the the dough and likely have more success in getting a flaky pastry if you practice with making pie shells for filled or custard pies first.
Perfect your flaky crust technique here and then move on to two crust fruit pies when you are more comfortable with pie pastry.
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The Very Best Homemade Lemon Meringue Pie
If your pie comes from powder in a box, STOP! A fantastic homemade lemon meringue pie, made completely from scratch, tastes much better and is actually just as easy to prepare.
Ingredients
For the Pastry. Sufficient for two 10 inch pie shells.
- 1 cup very cold butter cut into small cubes
- 2 ½ cups flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ cup ice water, or a little more. Only enough to make a dough form.
For the Filling
- ⅓ cup corn starch
- ⅓ cup cake flour
- pinch salt
- 1 ½ cups sugar
- 5 egg yolk slightly beaten
- Zest of 2 lemons, very finely chopped
- Juice of 2 lemons, about ¼ cup.
- 2 cups water
- 3 tablespoon butter
For the meringue
- 5 egg whites
- 1 ¼ cups sugar
- ¼ teaspoon cream of tarter
- Pinch salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
To make the pastry
- Using a food processor or a pastry blender cut cold butter into flour and salt until mixture resembles a coarse meal. Small pieces of butter should still be visible.
- Pour cold water over the mixture and work in by tossing with a fork until dough begins to form. Use your hands as little as possible and work the dough as little as possible.
- Divide dough into 2 balls, flatten into 2 rounds, wrap in plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator to rest for a minimum of 20 minutes. You can freeze the second round for another time.
- You can make your dough the previous day but make sure you take it out of the fridge for 10 minutes to warm slightly before rolling out.
- Roll the dough into a 12 inch round and place in the bottom of a 10 inch pie plate.
- Trim and flute the edges as desired. Poke a few holes in the bottom of the pastry shell, rest in the refrigerator for an additional 20 minutes before baking at 400 degrees F for 12 – 15 minutes or until golden brown. (For best results I often now blind bake the crust as shown tin the photos above.)
- Cool completely before adding the filling.
To make the filling
- In a medium saucepan, combine corn starch, cake flour, sugar and salt. Pour in water and stir constantly over medium low heat until mixture comes to a slow boil.
- Remove the pan from the heat and reduce the flame to low.
- Pour about a cup of this mixture onto the slightly beaten egg yolks while whisking constantly.
- Pour the egg mixture back into the rest of the other mixture in the pot, whisking constantly.
- Return to the stove and cook for an additional 3 minutes stirring constantly.
- Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice and lemon rind.
- Finally whisk in your butter one tablespoon at a time.
- Pour the filling into the baked and cooled shell. Let stand for a few minutes while preparing the meringue.
To prepare the meringue
- Whip egg whites, vanilla, salt and cream of tarter to soft peaks.
- Very gradually add the sugar while continuing to beat the egg whites.
- Dollop in heaping tablespoonfuls onto pie. Gently spread over the filling, making sure that the meringue touches the crust all the way around the pie. This will help to prevent the meringue from shrinking.
- Bake in a 325 degree F oven for about 20 to 25 minutes or until the meringue is well browned. Cool pie thoroughly in the refrigerator before serving.
- Keep refrigerated.
- Dip a sharp knife in cold water to help with cutting the pie into slices and clean the knife with paper towel between cuts.
Notes
In reviewing the comments and following up with some people who had issues with this recipe, please note that you should not attempt to make any substitutions. At the end, when it says to add the butter, ONLY REAL DAIRY BUTTER will work. Many people have reported using margarine, even the tub of spreadable margarine. That is the road to sure disaster. Butter means butter.
- The amount of lemon juice is often asked about online and in emails. I get about ¼ cup of lemon juice out of 2 lemons. For safety sake don't add more than that. The lemon flavour comes mostly from the zest anyway. The juice just gives it a little tangy flavour. -Be sure to cook the base enough before adding the juice and butter. Use a silicone spatula to scrape the bottom as you stir, so that the mixture will not burn, but it has to be as thick as possible as is shown in the photo.
The nutritional information provided is automatically calculated by third party software and is meant as a guideline only. Exact accuracy is not guaranteed. For recipes where all ingredients may not be used entirely, such as those with coatings on meats, or with sauces or dressings for example, calorie & nutritional values per serving will likely be somewhat lower than indicated.
Nutrition Information
Yield
12Serving Size
gAmount Per Serving Calories 299Saturated Fat 12gCholesterol 129mgSodium 284mgCarbohydrates 27gSugar 20gProtein 3g
If I wanted to replace the meringue with whipped cream do I still need to cook the pie? Or refrigerate it? Thank you!
Refrigerate.
I'm pretty sure that I will use your recipe for a birthday party this week. Is your lemon filling that yellow on it's own or did you add coloring? I know that I have made many lemon parfaits but the lemon alone was not enough color. Sorry, I will use my pie crust recipe that Grandma taught me. She would be sad...hahaha. They are good old fashioned delicious crusts.
The colour will depend on your lemons and egg yolks. My lemons were a very deep colour but I'd add a couple of drops of food colouring if it seemed too pale.
I made this twice last week and both times were a big hit with the family! I found the original receipe a bit sweet for my tastes so for the second pie, I reduced the sugar in the filling and the merignue to 1 cup each and enjoyed it much more. If you this is the first time making lemon merignue pie from scratch like it was for me, here are a couple tips:
(1) When blind baking your crust (meaning baking the crust without any filling), ensure you poke holes in the crust bottom and weigh it down with parchment paper and an even layer of raw beans or rice. I didn't do this, and my crust shrank to almost half the size. I had to throw out the crust and start over.
(2) Beat the merignue on high. I started off at medium and 45 mins went by before any peaks even started to form, and my hand mixer is brand new! Once I switched to my highest setting, it only took 10 mins for the peaks to become stiff.
Overall, an excellent recipe and would make it again.
Can I bake the crust and fill the pie one day and the next day add the meringue to the cold filling the next day?
You can but the condensation on top of the cold pie will likely cause the meringue to slide off the pie.
Hello I want to make this but I read in the instructions for the filling it asks for water to mix in with the dry ingredients on the stove top but how much water?
It's in the instructions.
OMG best pie I ever made! Turned out picture perfect and tastes amazing, Thank you Barry!
Overall this was delicious but I had a slight metallic aftertaste. What did I do wrong?
I'm guessing acid reaction with the type of metal pot.
Is it absolutely necessary to use cake flour? I have celiac and can only use gluten free flour, could I just substitute?
I've only ever made the recipe as is.
Can I just use a frozen pie shell ??
Not sure why you're asking that but yes, it is your choice.
Tried this pie tonight, it turned out beautifully! Not sure why other’s filling wouldn’t thicken, mine did no problem;although it did take a little while so maybe it just takes a little more patience. The only issue I had was I didn’t beat my meringue long enough so my peaks fell a little and it spread over the edges of the pie so I had to cut the excess off; but that was an error on my part. Overall it turned out pretty good! This recipe is definitely a keeper if you like lemon!
All worked beautifully except The dough. I followed recipe correctly, used a pastry blender...looked great but the 1/4 c of cold water or a little more did not get the misture wet enough to make a dough that I could roll out. I had to use a store bought crust. What happened?
The dough needs to rest in the fridge for the water to equalize through the dough. It's fine to have a dry dough when it is wrapped. It comes together in the fridge. More water will only make for a tough, not flakey crust.
Hello, LOVE your site, Barry! I just thought I'd add a little note: when making the crust, I use my food processor as you mentioned, but I keep it running as I very slowly add the very cold water (from the fridge) until it just comes together in a ball. This way I can easily judge the correct amount of water to add without adding too much. As you said, I then wrap in cling-film and refrigerate for about 10 minutes before rolling. Thank you from Ontario!!
That's good if it works for you. I do it for short crust pastry. Stick with the shortest time in the food processor that you can or else you may over work the dough and incorporate the butter too much and your pastry will not be flakey.
I made this twice now. 1st time I did the juice of two lemons and it came out runny. Lesson learned exactly 1/4 cup the 2nd time and perfect results. Thank you! I will continue to make thi recipe!