Bits of Carey

Since it is winter, gone are the weird and wonderful tropical fruits. However, one does forget about good old faithful citrus fruit that only flourishes in winter really.  In summer, I long for winter when you can buy a pocket of oranges for R 10 and look forward to making a huge batch of freshly squeezed OJ (however, you never actually manage to do it and you are stuck with 30 + oranges!).

We had the family around on Sunday for my mom’s birthday, and I decided to make one of her favourite desserts – Lemon Meringue Pie, and while I was at it, why not milk tart too! To my disappointment, I had no vanilla essence in the cupboard!! NO!! What to do? I glanced at my pile of oranges and thought an orange infused Milk tart would suffice. So that is what I did. We had Citrus inspired desserts.  Lemon Meringue pie and Citrus Milk tart.

Lemon Meringue Pie

This dessert reminds me of my childhood, my gran would walk through the front door like a ray of sunshine every Sunday with a Lemon meringue in her hands… we never grew tired of it!

A few years before she passed away, I watched her make one and she said with her bubbly voice (almost like Meryl Streep as Julia Child), ”…the trick is to stir the condensed milk mixture gently, never whisk and it will come out smooth and velvety everytime!”. And it is so true, so everytime I make lemon meringue I think of my beloved Oma Pat.

What you will need:

1 packet tennis biscuits or digestive (if you do not like coconut)

50 g melted butter

a bit of hot water

3 eggs yolks

1 can full cream condensed milk

juice and zest of 2 lemons

3 egg whites

3 T castor sugar

1 t lemon juice or vinegar

1 t vanilla essence or 1 T lemon zest

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees

In a food processor, blits the biscuits, then add the butter, blend until the crumbs clump together, add some hot water if it does not. Press into a greased pie dish.

Gently stir the yolks, condensed milk, juice and zest until well combined. Pour over the crumb base.

Bake for 20 – 25 minutes or until firm to the touch. Allow to cool slightly.

Meanwhile, Beat the egg whites, castor sugar and lemon juice until soft peaks form. fold in some extra lemon zest or vanilla essence.

Reduce the oven temperature to 170 degrees.

Gently spread onto the cooled filling and bake for a further 10 – 15 minutes or until golden.

Citrus milk tart

I used the Milk tart recipe I posted last month, just replaced the vanilla essence with the zest of 2 oranges.

Go to http://blogs.food24.com/BITSOFCAREY/ol-fashioned-milk-tart for the recipe.

These went down well with freshly brewed coffee!

So don’t you just love citrus fruit?

What would we do without oranges and lemons?

C xx