Meg is a bit obsessive about lemon meringue pie. She has actually refused to go back to a once favorite, local restaurant (that shall remain nameless), because it was sold without the lemon meringue pie recipe! No kidding.
.jpg)
Upside Down Lemon Meringue Pie
Source: “Martha Stewart Living”, May 2014
Active time: 50 minutes
Total time: 12 hours
Serves: 8
Crust
Unsalted butter, softened, for pie plate
4 large egg whites, room temperature
¼ t cream of tartar
1 c sugar
Filling
8 large egg yolks, room temperature
1 c sugar
1 T plus 1 t finely grated lemon zest (from 2 lemons)
¼ c plus 2 T fresh lemon juice (from 2 lemons)
1 c heavy cream
Topping
1 c heavy cream
1 T sugar
1 lemon, for serving
Preheat oven to 300’ with rack in center. Lightly brush 1 9-inch pie plate with butter. Whisk together egg whites and 1 T cold water with a mixer on high speed until foamy, about 30 seconds. Add cream of tartar and continue to beat until soft peaks form, about 1 minute. Gradually add sugar and beat until thick, glossy peaks form, about 5 minutes.
Transfer egg-white mixture to prepared pie plate; spread along bottom and up sides to form crust. (Don’t spread past rim of pan.) Bake meringue until crisp and light golden on outside, about 40 minutes. Turn off heat and let cool in oven 1 hour, then transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely.
Meanwhile, whisk egg yolks in a medium saucepan (off heat) until thickened and pale yellow, 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk in sugar and lemon zest and juice. Place over medium heat and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until mixture is very thick, about 10 minutes. Transfer to a large bowl. Cover with plastic wrap, pressing it directly onto surface of curd. Refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, at least 1 hour and up to 1 day.
Whisk curd until smooth. Whip cream with a mixer on high speed until soft peaks form, about 30 seconds. Working in batches, gently fold whipped cream into curd. Fill meringue crust with lightened curd; smooth top. Refrigerate, loosely covered, at least 8 hours and up to 1 day.
Whip cream and sugar with a mixer on high speed until stiff peaks form, about 40 seconds. Spread over pie. Finely grate lemon zest over top. Slice with a chef’s knife, wiping blade between cuts, and serve.
.jpg)
We felt that a salad was required to justify the pie. We included plenty of protein and feel really good about that. This salad is our take on a salad that Sue eats on a fairly regular basis at another local restaurant (not the missing pie restaurant). Their recipe uses fried chicken strips, but we oven baked ours with crispy panko coating. Otherwise, the ingredients are the same. Oh yes, and we made a killer garlic and blue cheese dressing for it.
Sue & Meg’s “Fried” Chicken Salad
Recipe developed by Sue & Meg For Saturday Night Specials 05/31/2014
Serves 2
Breading for chicken:
½ cup panko bread crumbs
¼ cup flour
¼ cup cornmeal
½ tsp. granulated garlic
Salt and pepper to taste
½ tsp. or to taste ground chipotle
½ cup milk for coating
Vegetable cooking spray
Salad ingredients:
4 chicken tenders, sliced into 1 ½ - 2 inch strips
1 cup cherry tomatoes
½ cup chopped red onion
2 hard-boiled eggs, quartered
2.25 oz. can sliced black olives
2 strips of bacon, cooked and crumbled
1 head Romaine lettuce, torn into bite size pieces
½ cup sharp cheddar cheese, cubed
Blue Cheese dressing (see our recipe)
Combine breading ingredients in a Ziploc bag. Dip chicken in milk, toss in bag until well coated.
Place on silicone coated baking sheet or rack. Spray with vegetable oil on both sides, (we used a “Misto”). Cook in a 375 degree oven for 40 minutes turning once halfway through cooking.
Allow time to cool chicken slightly before adding to salad.
In a large bowl, combine lettuce, chopped onion, tomatoes, cubed cheddar, and olives. Divide onto two plates. Arrange sliced chicken strips, eggs, and crumbled bacon on top of greens. Serve with dressing on the side.
 |
| Salad before dressing |
 |
| Salad with dressing |
Recipe developed by Sue & Meg For Saturday Night Specials 05/31/2014
½ cup whipping cream or half and half
½ cup mayonnaise
¼ tsp. salt
½ tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1 large clove garlic, grated
¾ cup crumbled blue cheese
Combine all ingredients except blue cheese in a bowl and whisk until combined. Add blue cheese and stir.
Serve in a bowl to ladle liberally onto salad. This makes a thick dressing. If you prefer a thinner dressing add a bit of milk.
.jpg) |
| Killer Garlic Blue Cheese Dressing |
.jpg)
Our Unsolicited and biased opinions:
We love chipotle and adding it to the breading base gives a nice smoky kick to the chicken. You can omit it if you are not a fan of chipotle, or add something that you like.
The combination of all the ingredients in this salad is like a party in your mouth! Add the blue cheese dressing and you elevate it to a jamboree ... break out the party hats (and the Cava). It has everything, the crunch of the lettuce, red onion, bacon and the chicken and the lusciousness of the cheese and olives, not to mention the blue cheese dressing. We didn’t think about the pie once while we were eating this salad.
Being the critic/fan of lemon meringue pie that she is, the next one of these that Meg makes will be totally different. Here are the things that she would do differently:
- Increase the amount of lemon juice in the curd. It was not tart or lemony enough to our taste.
- Don’t add whipped cream to the curd for the filling. (The filling doesn’t gel properly after adding the cream.)
- Make the meringue into individual servings rather than a pie crust. This crust did not come out of the pie plate as advertised.
This is a very sweet dessert; too sweet for us and a disappointment.
However, the path to this pie lead us to a wonderful salad. Find your happiness where you can. We will live to “justify pie” another day.
Loving all things lemon, I can feel your disappointment with the pie. I agree that I would not dilute the lemon filling with the whipped cream. That almost amounts to an adulteration! Good idea about adding more lemon juice than a recipe calls for. And more zest. Since I like the texture of zest, I use a zester that makes strings and then rough chop them. That being said, I am so happy that eating a salad with eggs, bacon, cheese, olives, and chicken topped with dressing that includes cream and mayonnaise is sufficient to justify pie! Also, I would not let that pie go to waste!
ReplyDeleteJustification has everything to do with mindset and we were of the mindset that we were having a salad! There are choices in life . . . . but there was a lot of protein in this salad too. :-)
ReplyDeleteIf you are making this kind of upside down pie, please note that the meringue will be chewy the next day. This pie does not hold up well as leftovers.