County Fair: Blue Ribbon-winning Lemon Meringue Pie recipe

This prize-winning recipe for Lemon Meringue Pie is featured in Liza Gershman’s new cookbook, “County Fair: Nostalgic Blue Ribbon Recipes from America’s Small Towns” (Images Publishing, $45), which includes 80 recipes representing all 50 states.

This particular recipe hails from Debra Bond, whose mother won a blue ribbon at the Douglas County Fair in Roseburg, Oregon, two years running. “The recipe came from a neighbor down the street,” Bond says in the book, “and my mom made a few revisions on her own to make the most perfectly, tart, fluffy, crumbly lemon pie.”

Lemon Meringue Pie

INGREDIENTS

Pie crust:

2 cups flour

½ teaspoons salt

9 tablespoons shortening (Crisco)

6 tablespoons butter (or just enough to hold the dough together)

Lemon filling:

1½ cups water

1¼ cups sugar

Slurry: ½ cup water plus 5½ tablespoons cornstarch

3 egg yolks (use the whites for the meringue)

Grated zest and juice from 1 lemon

1 tablespoon butter, room temperature

Meringue:

3 egg whites

Pinch of salt

1 cup Kraft Marshmallow Crème

DIRECTIONS

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Use a pastry cutter to blend the pie crust ingredients; be careful not to overwork the dough. Roll between two pieces of plastic wrap to prevent sticking. Place rolled dough in pie pan. Bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown.

For the filling: In saucepan, mix water and sugar and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and add the cornstarch/water slurry, stirring constantly. Cook the sugar syrup on low for 15 minutes or until cornstarch taste is gone.

Place the egg yolks in a heatproof bowl. Slowly add several tablespoons of the hot sugar syrup to the yolks, stirring constantly so you don’t cook scrambled eggs. Then slowly add all the egg mixture back into the sugar syrup. Add the lemon zest, juice and butter and cook for several minutes on low, until the butter is fully melted.