Real Lemon Curd:
-4 egg yolks (I used 6 to have extra) keep the whites separated with no yolks aside for the pie!
-1 tsp real vanilla
-2 lemons zested
-2/3 C lemon juice no pits!
-1/2 C sugar (fine)
-4 small drops organic natural yellow colour (I buy from www.naturesflavors.com)
-1/2 C demi-sel (half salted) butter, cut in cubes and kept chilled in the fridge. Never ever room temperature or melted!
Method:
-Fill a small pot 1/4 of the bottom with water and heat on medium high heat, don't boil! Just under a simmer, no bubbles break the surface.
-In a medium sized bowl whisk together, yolks, sugar, and vanilla, until well mixed.
-Continue to whisk & slowly add the lemon juice, so as not to burn the yolks with the acid. (Yes, the acid can "cook" the yolks)
-Whisk in zest and then place your bowl on the pot filled 1/4 of the way with water that you heated. Make sure the water does not touch the bottom of your bowl, if it does empty some as you have too much. This is your double boiler to cook your egg mixture more slowly without direct heat that often results in scrambled lemony eggs instead of lemon curd.
-As it cooks and you constantly whisk, switching hands as you need to rest one or the other, you will notice the colour and texture will change. It needs to feel thicker when you whisk and must coat the back of a spoon. Chef's call this, Napper la cuillier.
-When it coats a spoon and you can draw a line through it with your finger that holds, immediately remove it from the heat.
-Keep going until all the butter is incorporated, I sometimes need to place the bowl back on the double boiler for 15-25 seconds to warm it again if the butter drops the temp too quickly. Just be careful when doing this.
-At this point you may keep your curd in a jar in the fridge and feel free to eat it with fresh blueberries, or on scones or toast, or use in a few days to fill a cake. Or snack it straight out of the jar, Mine never lasts more than 3-5 days because it always gets eaten. I found this pic on the net of curd in a jar as I seem to have deleted mine, but you get the point.
This is mine as I "taste test" the batch, don't allow anyone to deter you from this task. It is of utmost important that you do this, you are taking one for the team. You're so good, all you do is give, give, give. (hehheh)
-Chill the pie with Saran wrap touching the curd, so as not to get skin.
-Let chill for 4-5 hours. Put the meringue on it just before serving. Recipe follows.
So for the crust, I can't even touch gluten anymore so the guest crust is one I bought in the store and baked as per the package directions, making sure to dock it (poke holes) using a fork. It's the big guy in the pics on the right.
Gluten free crust for my single serving used 3/4 C of ground almonds, 2 Tbsp of melted organic coconut oil, and 1tsp of Organic honey.
Then I took a damp new paper towel and cleaned up the bowl before pouring the filling into my bowl and then the rest into the cooled pie shell.
Use the 6 room temperature egg whites with absolutely no yolk or fat in them. They won't whip up if there are even trace amounts of fat in them or on any of your equipment. Start whipping them with a hand blender until they are foamy.
Add 1/4 C of fine sugar and continue beating. You will notice that with the addition of sugar the texture changes and you start to get a glossy product which begins to rise very quickly.
Top left are soft peaks, keep whipping until you get stiff perks but not beyond that or your meringues will become rocky and then they will fall. Never to rise again and then you must start anew and try try again. ((hugs if this happens with a spot of tea))
On the right is what you are looking for, big brawny tough guy meringues that hold their curves. I actually went a bit too far and they ended up a bit grainy, I had to walk away from them for a while to answer a call and ended up needing to re-whip them because they began to fall, don't do that! My family is not picky so they got the pie with the grainy meringue.
Heat your oven on High broil.
Now start spreading on your chilled curd filled pies my friends and just have fun spreading and lifting to make peaks, or pipe it if you like.
This is what it all looks like along with the finished pretties!
Enjoy!
BTW, if it's a really hot summer day, really keep these in the fridge, super cold, and don't leave them out before cutting and serving, They will melt and your curd will NOT hold-up. You can add a packet of dissolved gelatin to the still warm curd to help it hold its shape if you need to travel with this pie in warmer weather.
