Easy lemon meringue pie

by marie
lemon-meringue-pie

Ingredients

For the shortbread pastry:

  • 1 egg yolk
  • 250 g plain flour
  • 125 g softened butter
  • Pinch of salt
  • 50 cl  water

For the lemon cream:

  • 3 egg yolks
  • 1 can of sweetened condensed milk (around 400 g)
  • 2 small lemons or 1 big one (organic as we will use the skin)

For the meringue:

  • 3 egg whites
  • 60 g icing sugar

Instructions:

The shortcrust pastry

  1. Take out the butter from the fridge 2 hours before starting cooking so that it’s soft, but not melted.
  2. Place the flour and the salt in a large bowl.
  3. Add the softened butter and knead with your fingertips for 3 minutes, rub the mixture between your hands. It should be like sand.
  4. Add the water and egg yolk to bind the dough, mix quickly with the flour and form a ball.
  5. Knead your dough on the floured work surface with the palm of your hand to integrate the butter, repeat several times.
  6. Roll out the dough on baking paper and place in a pie pan. Prick it with a fork and put it in the fridge.
  7. Blind bake in the oven at  190 ° C for 15 min. Really important as otherwise the crust will get soggy with the lemon filling. If you can line the inside of your crust with foil or parchment paper and fill it with dried beans, rice. I personally keep it 1 hour in the fridge before baking it so it keeps its shape without any weight.

The lemon cream

  1. Collect zest from the 2 lemons and their juice in a large bowl.
  2. Add the can of condensed milk and the 3 egg yolks, mix well.
  3. Spread out on the pie crust and flatten.
  4. Bake in the oven at 190 ° C for 20 min, until golden.
  5. Remove from the oven.

The meringue

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff, add the icing sugar midway.
  2. Place on top of the lemon cream on the pie. You can use a pipping bag to do nice shapes or just play with your spatula.
  3. Bake in the oven at 180 ° C few minutes and switch to grill mode just to golden the top. Watch out as it can be super quick and burn very easily.
  4. Let the pie cool down entirely in the oven, above all do not place in the fridge right away.
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