If the sun’s out and the temperature’s hot, there’s a great chance we’re making a tasty lemon confection. Cake, pudding, “lemonies”…if it’s got lemon in it, we’re going to eat it. And, of course, the same goes for this Arizona sunshine lemon pie. Not only does it taste amazing, as a delicious, creamy lemon custard, but it’s also cute to boot with a great latticed crust on top. Hello, who wouldn’t look at this and love it immediately? No one. No one can resist this stuff! So, sometimes custards can be a little intimidating, since they involve tempering eggs – and no one wants to have to do that more than once, if it ends up curdled the first time – but we’re here to assure you that the process is totally doable. It requires patience and making sure you don’t cook the eggs too high or too fast, but other than that, just about anyone can confidently make a custard – you’ll see!
Since we want to focus our energies on the custard, we think it’s fine to skip making a from-scratch crust and instead use store-bought. You’ll get all the amazing, homemade flavor from the custard, and the crust acts as a supplement to that, rounding out the flavor, without taking attention away from it. To make your lattice: roll out your first pie dough sheet and set that in your pie pan, then fill ‘er up and lattice the top portion! You’ll lay all the pie crust strips down that are going in one direction (all vertical to start), then you’ll simply pull up alternate strips and lay down one horizontal piece of pie dough.
Return the alternating vertical strips to their original position, then repeat with the vertical strips that were originally lying flat. Easy-breezy! This is a perfectly delicious pie, that hits the spot all summer long…you really can’t go wrong!
45 minutes to prepare serves 8-10
INGREDIENTS
1 (13.25 oz.) package refrigerated store-bought pie crust
Filling:
1 cup whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup freshly-squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon lemon extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 pinch kosher salt
PREPARATION
Preheat oven to 325º F.
Unroll one refrigerated pie crust and place in pie plate. Unroll second pie crust and cut into even-sized strips.
In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar, lemon juice, lemon extract, vanilla extract and salt until combined.
In a medium saucepan over medium heat, whisk together milk and heavy cream and bring to a low simmer.
While whisking continuously, pour 1/4 cup warmed milk into egg mixture to temper eggs, ensuring they don’t scramble.
Once temperature of eggs has risen, whisk in remaining hot milk mixture.
Pour custard into prepared pie crust, then arrange pie crust strips into a latticed pattern.
Place baking dish in oven and bake for 28-32 minutes, or until center is set, but still jiggly.
Remove dish from oven and cool on cooling rack. Once fully cooled, place in refrigerator for at least 2 hours, or until set, then slice, serve and enjoy!