Lemon Meringue Pie

Let me ask a question.  Is there anything better than a homemade pie?  Often I come in the door from work and one of my first questions is, "What's for supper?"  I'm seriously wondering what's in the pot and look forward to sitting down to a good meal with my family.  Tricia will tell me what's for supper and I'll be happy. The thing that moves my meter from happy to exuberant, though, are the following words, "Hey, I made a homemade pie for dessert!"  A big smile will cover my face and my next question will be, "What kind?" Granted, there is no wrong answer to this question as I can't say that I've ever run across a slice of pie that I didn't enjoy.

Tonight the answer was Lemon Meringue pie.  We juiced and froze a bunch on lemon juice from lemons last year into ice cube trays and have a gallon size freezer bag full of lemon juice cubes.  We can pop these cubes into any old dish that calls for lemon juice.  Tonight it happened to be used for lemon meringue pie and it was heavenly.  I took a nice picture of the pie to preserve the memory as it wouldn't sit there undisturbed for long!

Homemade lemon meringue pie

I like the way that the meringue has peaks.  It reminds me of waves on the ocean. Pies also remind me of other things.  I remember that my parents used to bring me to a Diner in LeCompte, Louisiana when I was a kid that was famous for their pies. The name of the place is Lea's Lunchroom.  Now Lea's is famous for their ham sandwiches and fried chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy, but the thing that they are really well-known for is their pies.  Wow!  When I was a boy, I remember eating there on Sunday afternoons and Mr. Lea (who looked like Colonel Sanders) would come around to everyone's table.  He would be all decked out in a white suit and he'd ask, "Did you go to Sunday School this morning?"  Nice memories and nice pies.  My wife makes a mighty fine pie, too!

Waves of deliciousness

Just check out a slice of this bad boy with the homemade crust, meringue standing at attention, and the tart lemon filling beckoning.

Any way you slice it, this pie is good!

The last ingredient in the recipe that Tricia uses says it is optional - yellow food coloring.  Since we use our pastured eggs from free range chickens to make this pie, the dark yellow yolks provide all the color that you'll need, so the food coloring never gets used

The fork view

Russ is in from college on Spring Break right now and he demolished the last slice on the pie pan tonight. Mama's boy is back home for a week, so I'm sure we'll be eating more pie this week.  No complaints here.