Key lime meringue pie with ginger snaps
Baking queen Lorraine Pascale is here to bring a touch of Florida sunshine to our lives this morning with a mouthwatering Key Lime Pie.
Ingredients
60g butter250g ginger snap biscuits2 tbsp soft light brown sugar1 egg white
For the Swiss meringue:
120g egg whites (about 4 egg whites)240g caster sugar
For the filling:
4 eggs yolks397g tin condensed milk170ml lime juice (from about 5 standard limes, or 14 Key limes)1 tbsp lime zest, plus a little extra for decoration (optional)
Equipment:
23cm lose-bottomed fluted or straight sided tart tin, about 3 cm deep piping bag with 1.5cm plain nozzle
Method
To make the biscuit crust, melt the butter in a small pan or in the microwave and leave to cool a little. Put the biscuits and sugar into a food processor and blitz to fine crumbs. You can also do this by hand – simply put the biscuits and sugar in a plastic bag and bash with the end of a rolling pin.
Put the crushed biscuit mixture into a bowl and stir in the melted butter and egg white until evenly combined. Tip the mixture into the tart tin and press down to make an even crust on the bottom and up the sides of the tin. Press down really, really hard so that the mixture is compact and does not crumble too much when you come to cut the pie into slices.
Pop the lined tin into the fridge to firm up for at least 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to160C (fan 140C / 325F/ Gas 3).
Place the biscuit crust in the oven and bake for 10 minutes. When the crust is baked,remove it from the oven and set aside to cool.
Meanwhile, make the filling: put the egg yolks into a bowl and whisk them a little, then add the condensed milk. Whisk the mixture again until everything is nicely combined. Then add the lime juice and whisk again for a couple of minutes. Taste the mixture – I like to add lime zest to give the flavour a bit more of a kick, but see whether you think it needs it or not.
Put the crust lined tin onto a baking sheet and pour in the filling. Place the pie in the oven and bake for 10 -15 minutes, until the filling is just set but has not changed in colour.
When the pie is baked, remove it from the oven and leave it to cool down completelyin the tin.
When the pie has completely cooled down, make the Swiss meringue for the meringue kisses: fill a medium pan with 5cm of water and place it on the hob. Bring the water to the boil over a high heat, and as soon as it is boiling, reduce to a simmer. Meanwhile, put the egg whites and sugar into a heatproof bowl and whisk them up until they become light and frothy.
Put the bowl over the now simmering water and keep whisking all the time until thetemperature reached 70C (160F) on your sugar thermometer. This will take 5-7 minutes.Once it has reached this temperature, remove the meringue from the heat and keepwhisking until the mixture has cooled down and has become very thick, glossy and almost marshmallow-like in texture. It will take about 10-15 minutes to do this stage by hand, or once the mixture has reached 50C (121F) you can pop it into the bowl of a stand mixer with a whisk attachment, and whisk at high speed until it is body temperature and stiff peaks have formed – this will take about 6-8 minutes.
To check that it is ready, take some of the meringue on the end of the whisk, thenturn the whisk meringue-covered end up – the meringue should be super stiff and notfloppy. **You can replace the swiss meringue step with whipped cream and pipe on in the same way as below**
Half-fill the piping bag with the mixture – filling halfway ensures that the mixture does not squidge out of the top when you are piping.
To pipe kisses over the pie, I usually hold the nozzle about 5mm from the surface of the filling and then squeeze the piping bag. When the meringue kiss is the size I want it to be, I stop squeezing and lift off the nozzle. Repeat with the rest of the meringue until it is all used up, making sure there are no gaps between the kisses.
The meringue has already been cooked, so simply use a blowtorch to quickly colourthe kisses to a light golden brown.
When the pie is ready, serve it decorated with a little lime zest, if you fancy it.
Recipe taken from ‘Bake: show-stopping recipes made simple’ by Lorraine Pascale