Lemon Icebox Pie
This Southern pie is named "icebox" because it was traditionally set in the refrigerator rather than baked. This recipe comes from Atlanta's Silver Skillet diner. This recipe first appeared in the 2012 SAVEUR 100, with the story Lemon Icebox Pie.
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Credit: Todd Coleman
INGREDIENTS
2 cups graham cracker crumbs½ cup sugar
8 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted
2 cups fresh lemon juice
2 14-oz. cans sweetened condensed milk
2 egg yolks
16 vanilla wafers
1½ cups heavy cream, chilled
1 tsp. vanilla extract
A few notes:
Filling: I have a deep dish 9" pie plate that I used for this and I ended up with enough left over pie filling to make another small pie. (I ended up filling 4 ramekins) Even if I had pushed this to the pie's utter limit I feel I would have had filling left. Not sure how that worked out.
Whipped Cream topping: I added about 1/4th cup white sugar to the whipped cream on top because I was afraid the tartness of the pie wouldn't be offset as much as I would like. I feel that adding the sugar really made the whole thing blend together very nicely.
The ripeness of your lemons (I squeezed nine, and offset with the pre-squeezed stuff) will probably make a HUGE difference in the lemon taste (sweet/tart) of this pie. My store-bought, out of season lemons with a touch of pre-squeezed juice made a pretty great pie. I have no doubt that I will find some fresh off the tree fully ripe lemons later this year and make this pie again, only it will be "epic" at that point.
Overall, a truly amazing pie, I'll probably commit this one to memory in case the internet is ever out of reach.
I wanted to know if it was really 2 cups that the recipe is calling for or if that's a typo.
Thank you and happy eating!
nanda