Creamy, tangy lime filling with a thick graham cracker crust.
I’ve always liked the idea of key lime pie but have never tasted one that hit my tastebuds quite right. They’re always way too tart to the point where I don’t want to finish the slice … me only eating half a slice of pie is not normal… like maybe I’m ill. But I was up for some recipe testing, so 4 pies later I got everything just right.
I toned down how much lime juice goes into the filling. And I skipped lime zest all together because the filling shouldn’t have anything lumpy disrupting the creamy texture. Then I thickened up the crust to tone down the tartness of the filling.
For a few weeks, I couldn’t find sweetened condensed milk at the store, so I tried making my own homemade. Once I could find the canned stuff again, I compared it to my homemade stuff … I’m gonna save y’all some time … there is no difference in taste. Save yourself the hour of stirring cream and sugar on the stovetop and reach for the can.
Once I gave up on homemade sweetened condensed milk, this pie got super easy and relatively fast to make. It has very few ingredients, and it’s a great recipe to make ahead of time. The crust is just a simple graham cracker crust. And then the filling is just lime juice, sweetened condensed milk, and egg yolks cooked on the stove top.
For the lime juice, just buy your normal grocery store generic limes. Key limes are difficult to find, and when you do find them, they have very little juice in them so you need a ton of them to get enough juice. So while this is technically just a “lime pie”, there is very little difference in flavor. The key limes today are very different than the key limes that were grown 1900s, so the authenticity of the “Key Lime Pie” is gone anyways so use what’s convenient.
After you are done cooking the filling on the stove, strain it through a sieve. Do not skip the straining step or you’ll have little lumps of very unappetizing cooked egg in your filling. Then refrigerate for 4 hours and dollop with some whipped cream!
Happy baking!
- 1 ½ cups (180g) graham cracker crumbs (about 12 sheets crushed)
- ⅓ cup (65g) granulated sugar
- 6 Tbs butter, melted
- 14 oz sweetened condensed milk
- ⅓ cup (2.75 oz) egg yolks, whisked (about 5 large eggs)
- ½ cup +1 Tbs (4.5 oz) lime juice (about 4 limes)
- Preheat oven to 350˚F.
- Mix the graham cracker crumbs, sugar, and melted butter together.
- Press the mixture into a 9-inch pie dish and up the sides using a a flat bottomed measuring cup or glass.
- Bake for 10 minutes and let cool completely.
- In a medium sized pot, mix together the sweetened condensed milk, the egg yolks, and lime juice.
- Cook over medium low heat for 5 minutes stirring often and gently until the custard is steaming and about 125˚F.
- Increase heat to medium and continually (but gently) stir for another 5 minutes until it just begins to bubble.
- Pour the custard through a fine mesh sieve to remove any egg that may have solidified.
- Pour the strained custard into the cooled pie crust.
- Refrigerate uncovered (plastic wrap will stick to the custard until it’s set) for 4 hours or until set. At this point serve the pie or cover with plastic wrap.
- Serve with whipped cream on top.