Lemon Meringue Pie in a Glass - Amazing "No Dough" Shortcut Method - Food Wishes

[Music] hello this is Chef John from foodwishes.com with lemon meringue pie in a glass that's where I do not let the small package fool you this miniaturized lemon meringue features huge lemon flavor and other than briefly Browning the meringue we are not doing any baking and while this did take me a couple attempts trying to figure out how to get it in the glass I thought the final results were phenomenal since it basically tasted like the best lemon meringue pie I've ever had and to get started the first thing we'll do is not make a pie crust since we are actually going to use some chopped up shortbread cookies for that element so since I'm doing four I'm gonna go ahead and chop those up since as I learned in one of the test batches you can't really break up shortbread cookies into nice crumbles okay you either get big pieces or you get dust and I didn't want either of those things so we'll go ahead and chop those up and then we'll transfer those into the bottom of whatever glass we're going to use and by the way this classic Scottish shortbread I'm using is virtually identical in taste in texture to a classic pastry crust and that's it once we have those chopped up and in our glasses we can move on to the actual lemon filling which is going to start by separating two eggs which as you know I like to do in my hands since I think it's easier and it feels really cool and what we'll do is put two whites in this mixing bowl that will make into a meringue later and then the yolks we will add to the saucepan which is going to be the base for our lemon filling and then besides the two yolks we will also need one whole egg and that's it we'll go ahead and pop those whites in the fridge until we need them and then to our yolks and egg we will add a little touch of sugar as well as the zest from two lemons and while the juice we're going to add to this in a little while definitely tastes like lemons most of that really intense fragrant lemon flavor actually comes from the oils in the zest so even though a lot of recipes don't call for it I always like to add it in and then next up we will toss in some butter that I've cut into chunks and then after the butters in we'll finish with our last ingredient some freshly squeezed lemon juice and then what we'll do is grab a whisk and give this a brief mix just to break up those eggs a little bit and yes that would have been a little easier without the butter in there but I reserve the right to do things out of order and as you'll see it's really not going to make any difference at all because what we'll do after giving that a brief stir is head to the stove or we will place this over medium Heat and we will cook that stirring pretty much constantly until our mixture Heats through and that butter disappears and once that happens and our mixture starts to get hot I like to switch to a spatula and use that throughout the rest of the cooking process and the reason is as we stir with that it does a much better job of scraping along the bottom so that we don't risk any of our A's kind of scorching and scrambling on the surface and besides that Advantage if you use the Whisk the whole way you're going to whip in a bunch of air which is going to make the filling cloudy and much paler in color and it just won't look as good so if we want this to be great we must spatulate and then all we need to do here is keep cooking stirring as shown until the mixture thickens up and will hold a very sharp finger Mark if we drag it across the spatula which by the way is going to take a little while but the good news is this is by far the fastest method all right if you want this to take twice as long use the double boiler method which yes is safer but as you know danger is our middle name and if you're thinking I see a bunch of little specks in there isn't that scrambled eggs well no it's not those are all those little pieces of lemon zest and a little bit scrambled eggs maybe but it doesn't matter because we're going to strain this and a few specks of overcooked eggs that will be trapped in a strainer is way less of a problem than making this take twice as long as it should and like I said what we're waiting for is this mixture to thicken up and get a little bit shiny and if we drag our finger across the spatula it will hold a very sharp line so that was looking just about perfect and that's it once we've gone far enough we will pull that off the heat and we will pass it through a fine mesh strainer which is going to catch all that lemon zest and maybe a few tiny particles of overcooked egg and yes maybe a chalaza or two and then please note this stuff is going to thicken up really quickly as it cools so as soon as this is strained we will grab a spoon or Ladle and we will quickly but equally divided between our four glasses and it was right about here when I realized I think these glasses might be too narrow since it was really hard to transfer this in without making a mess so I made a mess which I kept cleaning up in between shots and eventually after way too much effort I got that into the glasses oh and if you're thinking that looks like a small portion size it is not really because this is a very intense lemon filling in fact it actually isn't even lemon pie filling this is a classic British lemon curd which is much more rich and intense so a little bit goes a long way in fact this is what they use in those fancy French lemon tarts which feature a generally thin layer of this stuff all right maybe a half inch if you're lucky but trust me the portion size here is perfect but the glass was not and not just because it was hard to get the stuff in oh you're gonna see why momentarily but anyway I went ahead and gave those the old tabithapa to settle everything down and then I wrapped them up and popped them in the fridge since we really do want to chill these for a few hours so that they're fully set and nice and cold and that's it once our lemon pie is done we can move on to the meringue so we will pull out our two egg whites and we will also need a little bit of sugar and a little touch of vanilla and what we'll do is start whipping these up until they get nice and foamy at which point we will stop and add half the sugar and the vanilla and then we'll continue beating or whisking until they look a little something like this at which point I like to dump in the rest of the sugar and then we'll simply continue beating these until we've achieved stiff peaks and before I show you what those look like let me quickly show you what they don't look like okay if you stop blending and pull those beaters out of the mix and the tips of the Peaks kind of flop over that is not far enough all right we want to keep mixing until the tips of those peaks stand up perfectly straight so that's looking just about perfect right there oh and if you don't know the trick when you're done mixing something with electric beaters just leave it on high and slowly raise it out of the bowl and thanks to centrifugal force everything will be thrown off the beaters onto the side of the bowl and that's it once our meringue is done we will transfer that into a Piping Bag with a star tip if you want that fancy professional appearance is optional and at the end of the video I'll show you what to do if you don't have a Piping Bag and tip and then what we'll do is pipe four rosettes definitely smaller in circumference than the glass we're using and these are going to swell up a little bit when they bake so definitely pay attention to the size since we do actually need to fit these inside the glass but anyway we'll pipe those out at which point we'll transfer those into the center of a 400 degree oven for about 10 minutes or so or until they're nicely browned and look like this oh yeah that kind of looks like the top of a lemon meringue pie and then what I did is let those cool for about five minutes before I carefully loosen one with a spatula so we could transfer down to our now fully chilled lemon mixture and I was trying to figure out the best way to do this before deciding I should just pick that up and transfer it in with my fingers since what could possibly go wrong with that well here's what went wrong I didn't drop it in straight and then tried to pick it up and it stuck to my fingers and tore apart so I pulled it out and did a little bit of cursing and then grabbed another one and tried to put it in with two forks which sort of worked but it stuck to those two and I tore the surface which made me curse a few more times so then the next one I tried with the backs of the fork which worked out just about as well as the first two attempts but anyway the moral of the story is that these glasses were way too narrow and I'm officially not recommending using something like this okay I really wanted to go for like a terrarium effect which would have been cool if I could have done it I mean I kind of did it but history books are not filled with people who kind of did things so as you'll see soon I did make some changes but anyway I finally got them all in cluding that screwed up one and I felt really bad because that one was Michelle's but anyway I wrapped those and popped them back in the fridge which is what you will do until you're ready for dessert and once I was I pulled out the best looking one and I grabbed a spoon and went in for a bite and it was absolutely magnificent okay slightly torn meringue topping notwithstanding this was really really good in the combination of those beautiful buttery crispy shortbread crumbles and that tart sweet intensely lemony flavored filling and of course that sweet caramelized meringue tasted as good as any lemon meringue pie or lemon meringue tart I've ever had and again if you use a lemon curd like we did you do not need a lot it is very rich and very intense and even though it might look kind of small compared to a slice of pie I think it is a perfectly sized portion and above and beyond the trauma that was caused by me trying to work in these little tiny narrow glasses I actually did love the appearance and I thought that terrarium effect I was going for was pretty effective but on a practical level those were just too hard to put together so after I finish that one I made some more which I put in these wider Coop classes which made everything much easier even though that meringue stuck to the fork a little bit I did have much more room to work with so using something more in this shape is probably a better idea or if you don't care about the see-through effect from the glass you could simply use a coffee cup or a Ramekin okay ultimately anything that holds the three components would work out just fine oh and then before I finish up let me show you what to do if you don't have a Piping Bag and star tip all right all you need to do is pile your meringue up on a baking sheet and yes you can use parchment paper or silt pads and then once you have that mounted up in the size you want we can we just press down and lift up with the back of the spoon to make some Peaks and valleys here and there and that's it I went ahead and picked those off the same way and not only is this method easier and you don't need a Piping Bag but if we're being honest it probably comes out looking the closest to an actual lemon meringue pie so maybe that is the best way to go so if you can't pipe don't cry I think that looks every bit as good as the other versions but anyway that's it what we're calling lemon meringue Pine of glass the number one reason people don't make pies is because they don't want to fuss around making a pie crust and then if you are doing a lemon meringue pie you have to bake the crust first and then put the filling in and then top it and it's a whole thing well here are things to use no shortbread cookie crumbles and then cooking our meringue separately we have a much simpler version but as I already mentioned tastes every bit as good if not better than a classic lemon meringue pie so whether you pipe or a spoon I think your gas will swoon which is why I really do help you give this a try soon so please follow the links below for the ingredient amounts a printable written recipe and much more info as usual this is always enjoy [Music]

Channel: Food Wishes

Views: 122,207

Keywords: Lemon, Meringue, Pie, dessert, baking, recipe, miniature, chef, john, food, wishes, cooking

Id: ux-LzTJuHZE

Length: 12min 17sec (737 seconds)

Published: Tue May 23 2023