PIEnicillin (aka: Penicillin Pie)

 

It’s officially Fall! As the air gets crispier and the trees change color, we start to get ill, one...by one...until finally no one is left but yourself and your best friend(‘s body because they’re probably dead too). Why haven’t you died with the rest of the population? 


You’ve been busy drinking Penicillins! No, not the antibiotic...the COCKTAIL! Somehow the perfect combination of smokey scotch, lemon, ginger and honey, have kept the virus at bay and kept you alive. 


Since you can’t survive on alcoholic drinks alone...here’s a recipe to combine those life sustaining ingredients with something to actually eat! Since everyone you knew is dead you have all the time in the world, so it doesn’t matter that this recipe takes a while to do. Anyway, I present to you….PIEnicillin!

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I went through a few different machinations of this one, and finally settled on something that’s a bit like a lemon bar, mixed with lemon meringue pie, mixed with a boozy cocktail.


Alright, first things first….the crust. I decided to go with a shortbread cookie crust like you’d have in a lemon bar. It’s super simple and needs to be done first because it has to be par-baked before the filling can be added and baked (you have to do this with pretty much any custard based pie because the bottom of the crust would never bake and no one wants a soggy bottom). So the crust is made just like a simple shortbread cookie, the only difference is that you’ll roll it out and then put it in a pie tin instead of cutting it into cookie shapes.


Ok, to begin, place the ROOM TEMPERATURE butter into your mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, and mix that on medium until it’s completely smooth. Then scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula and add in your powdered sugar. Mix that on low then bring up to medium and mix together until it’s fluffy and smooth and there aren’t any chunks of butter. Add in your vanilla and mix until combined. Scrape down the sides and give it a little more of a mix.


Next, scrape down the sides of the bowl again and sift your AP flour into the bowl. Mix that on low until the flour is JUST combined. It will form a crumbly dough and that’s good. Dump the dough out onto a clean surface and form it into a flat rectangle. Wrap and chill the dough for at least 30 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 325ºF.

Once the dough chills, unwrap it and place it onto a heavily floured surface. Roll it out until it’s about ¼ of an inch thick, and then place it into your pie tin. There will probably be some overhang, just trim it to the edges of the pie tin and then shape the edge however you like! I like a fluted edge so it kinda looks like a flower! Once it’s shaped, place it into the freezer for about 10-15 minutes


Next, remove it from the freezer and line the inside of the crust with parchment paper. Then, fill that with dried beans or pie weights, and bake in the 325ºF oven until the edges are lightly browned. Remove it from the oven and allow it to cool completely. Don’t turn the oven off because you’re going to use it for the next step.


While that cools, make your lemon filling. In a bowl combine your eggs, sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice and honey. Whisk those together until smooth, then sift in your flour and ginger. Once again whisk those together, and pour into your cooled pie crust.


Place onto a baking tray and put back into the oven. Pour a small amount of HOT water into the tray to create a little water bath. Then let you pie bake at 325ºF until the center of the pie is slightly jiggly and the edges of the filling have just started to brown. If you let it bake too long, it’ll crack and will be too dry. (it will probably bake for around 30-45 mins).


Remove from the oven and let the pie cool completely before placing it in the refrigerator until you’re ready with the meringues. 


The last step is the dried meringues. These are a swiss style meringue so they’re a little sturdier and will last longer. There are two major steps when making a swiss meringue:

  1. Heat your egg whites and sugar.

  2. Whipping them until stiff peaks.

The first step is to heat your egg whites and sugar. Place your whites and sugar into a heat safe bowl, and place that bowl on top of a pot with about an inch and a half of water in it. Bring that water to a simmer before placing your bowl on top. Place your bowl on top of the pot and make sure the bottom of the bowl isn’t actually touching the water, this will completely cook you eggs and you’ll end up with scrambled eggs which would be useless. Continuously whisk your egg whites and sugar until they are HOT to the touch and you can no longer feel any sugar granules. 


Once the whites/sugar are hot and silky, remove them from the heat and pour into your mixer bowl. Attach the whisk attachment and whip it on medium until you get stiff peaks. (this took me about 20 minutes so be patient). While that whips, turn your oven temperature down to 200ºF. Once you’ve got stiff sturdy peaks, meaning any lines drawn in the meringue won’t melt back into the mass of it and will stand on their own, pour your 2 T of PEATY scotch in and whisk until that’s just combined. Don’t let it mix too much because your meringue WILL deflate and that is very annoying. Trust me. It happened while I was doing the test batch and it was very hard to get it to come back to stiff peaks. 


Scoop your meringue into a piping bag with whatever kind of tip you’d like. I used a closed star tip to make little rosettes and stars, but you can use whatever you’d like! This newly empty world is your oyster! Pipe your meringues onto a baking sheet lined with a silpat or parchment and bake at 200ºF for about an hour/hour and a half. You just want to bake them until they’re completely dried. You’ll know they’re ready if you can remove them from the sheet very easily. 


Let the meringues cool and then place them on your pie! I just piled them on there as you can see:

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But I’d definitely suggest arranging them around the pie in a way that you can cut slices around them. I found it was very difficult to cut through them when they covered the whole thing. 


And that’s it! Now enjoy a slice of your life saving pie and wash it down with some booze while you wait to die of old age!


PIEnicillin

  • prep time: 1 hr 10 mins
  • cook time: 2 hrs 10 mins
  • total time: 3 hrs 20 mins

CRUST

Ingredients:

  • 4 oz. Salted Butter, Room Temp

  • 4 oz. Un-salted Butter, Room Temp

  • 2.75 oz. Powdered Sugar

  • ½ tsp. Vanilla

  • 10 oz. AP Flour

Instructions:

  1. Cream butter until fluffy
  2. Scrape down the sides and add sugar.
  3. Cream until smooth, scrape sides again and add vanilla
  4. Mix until combined, scrape sides
  5. Add flour and mix until crumbly dough forms.
  6. Form dough into flat rectangle, wrap, and chill for 20 minutes
  7. Roll out on a generously floured surface and place into pie pan.
  8. Shape crust and freeze for 10 minutes
  9. Par-bake the crust for about 15-20 minutes until edges are lightly browned. (line the inside of the crust with parchment and use dried beans or pie weights to keep crust in its shape as it bakes)
  10. Remove parchment/beans and let cool completely.

FILLING

Ingredients:

  • 3 ea. Eggs
  • 1 ½ c. Sugar
  • 1 T Lemon Zest
  • ½ c. Lemon Juice
  • ½ c. AP Flour, sifted
  • 1T Ground Ginger
  • 1T Honey

Instructions:

  1. Combine eggs, sugar, zest juice and honey in a bowl and whisk until combined.
  2. Sift in Flour, and ginger
  3. Whisk until completely combined.
  4. Pour into par-baked crust.
  5. Bake at 325ºF until center is only SLIGHTLY jiggly.
  6. Remove from oven and let cool completely.
  7. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Dried Scotch Meringues

Ingredients:

  • 5 ea. Egg Whites
  • 1½ c. Sugar
  • 1 T Cream of Tartar
  • 1 tsp Lemon Juice
  • ¼ tsp Salt
  • 2T Peaty Scotch

Instructions:

  1. Over a pot with water on the stove, place your bowl from your mixer.
  2. In the bowl combine egg whites, and sugar.
  3. Whisk together by hand until mixture becomes hot to the touch and is no-longer grainy.
  4. Remove from heat and put bowl on your mixer with the whisk attachment.
  5. Mix on medium speed and while it starts mixing, add cream of tartar, salt and lemon juice.
  6. Whip until stiff peaks are formed. The mixture will be shiny and sort of marshmallow like. (it took me about 20 minutes)
  7. Once stiff peaks have been achieved, add the 2T of scotch. Mix until JUST combined.
  8. Scrape meringue into a piping bag (I used a closed star tip to make rosettes, but have fun with it and use whatever piping tip you’d like)
  9. Pipe meringue onto a baking sheet lined with a silpat or parchment
  10. Bake at 200ºF until completely dried (30-45 mins)
  11. Let cool and place into a completely dry/air-tight containter.
  12. When you’re ready to serve your pie place the dried meringues on top and serve.
 
Lindsay MillerComment