Lemon Meringue Bites – All the flavors of Homemade Lemon Meringue Pie packed into perfect portable dessert for any occasion or season.
What many folks don’t know is that lemon meringue pie is actually a Philadelphia invention born out of the Victorian-era, courtesy of Mrs. Elizabeth Goodfellow, a 19th century pastry shop proprietress who ran America’s first cooking school. This classic pie of contrasting sweet-tart layers evolved from one of Mrs. Goodfellow’s signature desserts, a rich lemon pudding. At some point she cleverly thought to top her famous pudding with fluffy meringue. Although there are recipes for decorating cakes, tarts, and custards with sweetened and flavored egg whites starting in the 1600s, adding meringue to a pudding (pie) doesn’t appear until the nineteenth century.
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Lemon Meringue Bites
Ingredients
- 2 ready made pie crusts
- 4 egg yolks
- 1 egg for egg wash
- 1/3 cup corn starch
- 1 1/2 cups water
- 1 1/3 cups sugar
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup lemon juice
- 1 tbsp lemon zest
- 3 tbsp butter
Meringue
- 4 egg whites
- 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
- 1 pinch salt
- 3/4 cup sugar
Instructions
Filling
- Whisk egg yolks in medium size mixing bowl and set aside.
- In a medium saucepan, combine cornstarch, water, sugar and salt. Stir constantly over medium low heat until mixture comes to a boil. Boil for 1 minute. Remove from the heat and reduce the heat to low.
- Pour half of this mixture into the egg yolk mixture in a thin stream, whisking constantly. Now, pour the "hot" egg mixture back into the saucepan, whisking constantly.
- Return to the stove and cook for an additional 3 minutes stirring constantly.
- Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice and lemon zest. Finally whisk in butter one tbsp at a time. Stir occasionally until cool. (Setting in the bowl and placing in a larger bowl of ice will speed this up.).
Crust
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Grease and flour (or use nonstick cooking spray) a mini-muffin pan. Set aside.
- Roll the dough or pie crust out on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin. Using a round cookie or biscuit cutter (approximately 3 inches diamater) cut at least 24 rounds out ( or 12 rounds of each pie crust, if using store bought)
- Carefully press each round into the mini-muffin pan. Use your fingers to round the ends into a pie crust.
- Brush egg wash from one egg to the top edges of each pie.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden around the edges.
- Remove from oven and let the crust cool. Once cooled, use the tip of a knife to loosen the crusts from the mini muffin cups, but keep them in the pan.
- Spoon the lemon filling into each baked and cooled mini pie crust almost up to the top.
Meringue
- In a large bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form. Add the cream of tarter and salt and gradually beat in sugar until glossy, about another 10 minutes. Fill a pastry bag with the meringue and top filled mini pies.
- When ready to serve, preheat the broiler to high. Place mini-muffin pan under the broiler until the meringue is evenly toasted, about 2 minutes, or brown the merinque with a kitchen blow torch.
- Serve immediately or refrigerate until ready to serve.
