Alas, I’m few days late, but did manage to squeeze in a Lemon Meringue Pie for this month’s Daring Bakers challenge. Some unexpected car problems pushed baking out of my mind the past few days, and I must admit, not being the biggest fan of Lemon Meringue Pie, my heart wasn’t completely in this challenge. Distractions and ambivalence are a fell combination for baking, so it’s no wonder my results (and photos thereof) turned out a little funky.
My feelings about lemon meringue pie are mostly due to a slight distaste for meringue, but also probably because I’ve never had a homemade one. The words Lemon Meringue conjure up memories of factory-made pies eaten at diners and places like Eat ‘n Park rather than someone’s own special recipe. Still, I was curious about the challenge pie, as the recipe for the curd filling is made with water, a technique I’d never seen before. Reports from other Daring Bakers also claimed that this filling was very tart, which piqued my interest right away. There’s nothing I love more in a lemon dessert than a nice puckery tang.
I decided to make a few small tartlets shaped in mini-muffin tins as well as “free-style” tartlets: flat discs of dough decorated lemon-meringue style. I liked the way these looked the best. Since I avoid gelatine, I was pleased to see that the filling is thickened with cornstarch, and while it didn’t strike me as particularly tart while warm, an overnight rest in the refrigerator proved me wrong: the chilled filling did indeed have a subtle but pleasant tang. Not as strong a typical lemon curd, but nice all the same (and let’s face it, not everyone loves flavors that are super-sour). I will probably use this filling again for other tarts or pies, or maybe even to fill cakes. I had no problems whatsoever with the it being runny; it was quite firm and would have sliced well in a full-sized pie.
The crust was tender and did not shrink much, which was encouraging. I may also use this again, but will cut the sugar down a couple tablespoons (the combo of sweet crust, sweet filling, and sweet meringue was overkill for me). The meringue itself…eh. I still don’t care for meringue pies, but of course that’s not the recipe’s fault. I piped the topping in what was supposed to be a somewhat whimsical configuration, but didn’t foresee that the cute little turrets of meringue would break apart very easily from their brethren and be extremely difficult to press back on, since they also stick to fingers and everything else. But I liked the look of it, and might try this piping method again if I can be confident that no one will touch the final products except to eat them.
In conclusion, I can now say that homemade lemon meringue pies are definitely superior to assembly-line versions, but I probably won’t experiment much further on this front. I was glad to find the crust and filling recipes are good enough to reuse, and could imagine them pairing up again in a meringueless pie. Meanwhile, I await the next challenge! Thanks to Jen of The Canadian Baker for this one.