A true story of the Lemon Meringue Pie

Sometimes it happens that things we do turn around and come back to hit us like a boomerang. That is normal and acceptable if we send out a negative thing. Most of us expect it to happen. It’s like playing truant. It might give us a wonderful time – worth the risk of trouble the day after. But when we do things that are meant to be good and they turn around to kick us – then we experience one of these rare moments where nothing is what we thought it was. A blank moment of nothingness. A touch of existence.

That happened to me the other day – all because of a lemon meringue pie. I happen to be crazy about lemon meringue pie. The beautiful blend of sweet and acid, of pastry, curd and meringue – oh, it is beautiful – or it can be. Actually it is not very often I come across a really beautiful lemon meringue pie. They are often too evenly sweet, instead of balancing the tastes. But not many cakes are better when it is done right to my taste. Anyway, I was browsing the internet for something totally different, when this lemon meringue pie popped up on the screen. I looked at the recipe – and it contained only natural, good ingredients. I showed it to Merlin – he loves lemon meringue pie as much as I do – and within a second our plans for the day were non-existing. There was only one plan glaring at us: Make the lemon meringue pie!

We just got a whole heap of organic lemons the other day, the flour bin was full of our beautiful stone ground whole meal flour, the fridge was full of blue shelled eggs (those that taste like eggs did in my childhood, when we got them delivered weekly from a little lady with chicken in her back yard), and we had kilos of fresh organic butter. Was it going to be beautiful?? YES!

Sleeves up, pastry begin. It worked relatively ok. I got the dough rolled when it was still a bit too cold, it was difficult. Then it got a bit too warm, I added too much flour, and the big one cracked quite many places. We had enough pastry dough for one big pie and 6 small ones. It turned out ok – I mean who looks at the pastry in the bottom? – not me! Time for the curd. It smelled good, but wouldn’t really thicken. Maybe the sugar acted differently? We only have dried cane juice, which to us is the best sugar.

Well, the recipe said, never mind if the curd is a little thin – it doesn’t matter. So it was a little thin! The last thing to be done before the final baking was the meringue. This particular meringue was an Italian meringue. It sounded exciting and different – we jumped on board the recipe. It’s in a way a cooked meringue. We beat the egg whites, melt sugar in water and pour this boiling caramel into the egg whites under continuous beating. The meringue is ready when it has cooled down – and you have to keep on beating until it is cold. Sometimes I really appreciate electric power.

Everything was ready. Funny looking pastry in the tins, thin and not very curdled curd in the pot and a sticky substance in the mixer bowl supposing to be Italian meringue.

This is the way to learn – it may look funny – but don’t give up. It’s bound to turn into something??!!  We poured in the curd and covered with sticky egg whites. Tray in oven, bake until meringue turned brownish – lemon meringue pie ready!!!!!  We could hardly wait. Opened the oven door, grabbed the tray. Woww, steady now! The whole thing moved like an ocean in stormy weather. How can I describe this disaster? The meringue was even more sticky now, soft and wobbly, the curd underneath must have turned into soup and there was no way we could get the pastry out in one piece. We dipped a finger here and there and had a lick – if the taste had been heavenly we would have eaten it with spoons out of our soup bowls. Yeah, IF! The taste was NOT heavenly either. This was one of these examples where I felt that there was nothing to learn – except one thing – DON’T TRY AGAIN EVER!

Half a day wasted, the kitchen in total mess …. what to do? We tidied up the kitchen and decided to give the big pie to all the hungry birds visiting our garden. We had used an enamel dinner plate for tin and I thought it would be hopeless to try and tip the whole thing out on the lawn. The pastry would “drown” in this curd-meringue sea. Instead I put out the dish and left it to the little feathered ones to grab what they wanted of it. It wasn’t too popular, they didn’t like the sticky meringue, but they sat round nibbling the pastry edge. We always feed the birds, and especially the sparrows come here in quite big numbers. That was the end of our lemon meringue pie adventure – not to be repeated.

We looked out the window many times and had a laugh seeing the sparrows staying away from the sweet centre. Even they wouldn’t have it. And that was it! We started doing other things and later on in the afternoon I went out to hang up some washing in the garden. I had hung up only a few pieces when I looked towards the pie. Hey, there was a bird sitting right in the pie eating it. Maybe success after all? I wanted Merlin to see it, but wouldn’t walk in again – I might disturb the little indulger. I was behind the clothes on the line and reckoned the bird couldn’t see me. I bent down, picked up a few pebbles and threw them towards the house to catch his attention. It took three throws to make him come to the window and I signalled to him to have a look. He opened the door and walked into the garden. Why didn’t the bird fly away? And then it was that I realised that it was stuck in our lemon meringue pie. It couldn’t get away.

This was the moment of blank nothingness. From this little disaster turning into a little success it turned back into a real disaster. It is in a moment like that that the world stops spinning for just a split of a nanosecond. We sensed the poor being’s despair at the same time, and started running towards it. It spread its wings to fly – just to find that it couldn’t – and before we got there it was totally jammed with meringue and lemon curd. A little beautiful silvereye. Merlin reached out for the bird, took it in his hands and started to get the sticky stuff off it. When the lumps had gone we washed it in water, …. and were we happy to see it take off, wet but clean! Saved! The rest of the pie went to the compost… end of bird trap in disguise.