How Many Lemons Does it Take to Make a Lemon Meringue Pie?

For me, that answer is 6. I do love lemons but the paper cuts on my hands definitely do not.

This is my first official entry as a Daring Baker and things went well, although slowly – but that’s my fault. My old school food processor did a great job of making the dough. I did have to add more water to get it to the right consistency.

The pie crust turned out great and I had no problems transferring it to my pie plate.

I’m not that good at decorating pie crust edges (yet) so this is as fancy as it got, but doesn’t the pie look like a ray of sunshine? I didn’t put beans in the bottom of the crust because I thought, “I don’t need them.” Well, I kept checking on it and now I see why the instructions say to do that – the bottom of the crust kept puffing up. Thankfully, once I took it out of the oven it settled down for the most part. Lesson learned. I also forgot to bake the crust while making the filling (duh). So I had to keep stirring and heating (simmering) the filling to keep the film off of the top while I waited on the crust.
No harm done.

I took my coworker’s advice on keeping my utensils as cold as possible in order to make the meringue so I put my bowl in the freezer. I added more of the cream of tartar because it seemed like I was mixing that meringue FOR-EVER! I think it whipped up alright in the end. I think it’s pretty.

Glad to be a Daring Baker!

-JJ