What’s your secret?

Since joining the Daring Bakers 3 months ago, I have been challenged every month. This month was no exception. When I told hubby that the recipe for this month was a lemon meringue pie, his first response was “Oh my Mom makes a great lemon meringue pie.” Oh great! I have to compete with his mother.
Since we met, I have done a good job to not try to out-do her in any of his favorites. It’s just easier for everyone if he doesn’t have to choose me over her. His all time favorite dessert is blueberry pie and he loves mine, but I usually use a store-bought pie crust. This provides him with an easy out for why he likes his mom’s blueberry pie better since she makes her crusts. Well there will be no excuse with this pie. I’ll be making everything from scratch, the same way she does it (although with a different recipe). Talk about pressure…

Throughout the month, I’ve been trying to figure out when to make this pie. Hubby and I don’t need to eat an entire pie ourselves but with all the stories of weeping meringues and soggy crusts, I didn’t want to take it to work either… (Be sure to check out all the other Daring Baker‘s pies) I needed an event in the evening on the weekend. Then it dawned on me. I recently joined a group who meets once a month and everyone brings food and we watch a movie. They do a theme every month. This month’s theme is secret recipe. HOW PERFECT! While most people brought secret family recipes, I brought something that literally was a secret recipe. It was the best of both worlds. And since the potluck was the night before the big reveal, I figured it was ok to share the secret with a bunch of non-blogging friends. Sorry to break the rules about keeping the recipe a secret.

I decided to make cupcake sized pies to accommodate the potluck setting and the fact that I love cupcakes. Also, this way I’d be able to have one for pictures at home and not have to explain to my new acquaintances why I was taking pictures of the pie after the first piece was cut…


Now onto the baking of the cupcakes! As I mentioned, I’ve never made a crust before, so I didn’t really know what to expect. I do have a pastry cutter, so I was excited to use it! As usual, I got all my ingredients measured and ready to go prior to starting.

My dough was very crumbly after I turned it onto my Silpat. I shaped it into a disk they best I could, but I couldn’t pick it up to wrap it in plastic wrap. Instead, I just put plastic and a clean towel over the dough and put the Silpat onto a cookie sheet and stuck the whole thing in the fridge. I had to knead the dough quite a bit to be able to roll it out.
I used a prep-bowl that had a 4″ edge to cut my dough. I used a sharp knife and ran it along the outside of the overturned dough to cut my circles. Then I pressed each circle into the cupcake pan. The recipe made 12 cupcake crusts.

As you can see the crust got smaller as it baked. I think it’ll still turn out okay at this point. I prepped all my meringue and filling ingredients while the crust was baking (the 5 egg yolks go in the filling and the egg whites go in the meringue). I read that since you want to put the meringue onto the filling while it’s hot, it might be a good idea to actually make the meringue first so that it’s ready to go. So that’s what I did.
The meringue came together quite well. I followed the directions for the lemon curd exactly and it came out perfectly. It held up nicely and tasted AMAZING. Perfectly tart.

I had quite a bit of the lemon curd left since I wasn’t able to put very much into the cupcake pie crusts. I used an ice-cream scoop to put a big dollop of meringue on top of the filling. I made them look spikey cause it’s fun 🙂

I am very proud to admit that my filling held up nice and sturdy even after about 6 hours. These little guys were heavenly. Everyone at the potluck asked for the recipe.


Thanks to our host Jen for this lovely recipe! I really enjoyed making my lemon meringue cup-pies. Click HERE for the complete recipe (I figure this post is long enough already!)

    Pin It

27 Responses to “I’m bigger than you Yeast and you will make my bread rise!”

  1. #
    1
    Jen Yu — November 26, 2007 at 11:55 pm

    Oh yum! Those look terrific. Congratulations on a successful first challenge and welcome to the Daring Bakers. Great job 🙂

    -jen at use real butter

  2. #
    2
    Nikki57 — November 27, 2007 at 12:04 am

    You bread looks great! Congrats on overcoming your fear of yeast.

  3. #
    3
    Katie — November 27, 2007 at 12:06 am

    Congrats on your first challenge!! Looks great!

  4. #
    4
    MrsPresley — November 27, 2007 at 12:42 am

    1st, congrats on your 1st DB challenge! 🙂 2nd, congrats on overcoming your fear of yeast! i recently overcame this fear and am so glad i did! 🙂

  5. #
    5
    Michelle — November 27, 2007 at 1:05 am

    Congratulations on your 1st challenge! Your bread looks so great!

  6. #
    6
    Gigi — November 27, 2007 at 1:22 am

    Great looking bread! Congrats on becoming a daring baker. Isn’t it fun?

  7. #
    7
    Dori — November 27, 2007 at 2:20 am

    you’ve inspired me to get over my fear of yeast as well!

  8. #
    8
    breadchick — November 27, 2007 at 2:27 am

    Great job on your first challenge and on overcoming your yeast fear! Welcome to Daring Bakers!

  9. #
    9
    Chris — November 27, 2007 at 3:04 am

    Welcome to the DBs! You did a “wicked awesome” job!

  10. #
    10
    I(dot)J — November 27, 2007 at 4:14 am

    wow.. looking at your bread really reminded me of how this first challenge was for me.

    Great looking buns.

  11. #
    11
    Tartelette — November 27, 2007 at 5:05 am

    Bravo on your first challenge! You did fantastic! I loave how cozy the loaf looks, it must be great for sandwiches, and congrats on beating the yeast demons to a pulp this month!!

  12. #
    12
    ostwestwind — November 27, 2007 at 8:59 am

    Wow, what a success! All looks great

  13. #
    13
    Sheltie Girl — November 27, 2007 at 12:50 pm

    You did a wonderful job on your breads. Congratulations on your first DBer challenge!

    Natalie @ Gluten A Go Go

  14. #
    14
    Candace — November 27, 2007 at 1:36 pm

    Nice job! Love the step by step photos!

  15. #
    15
    ~Amber~ — November 27, 2007 at 3:22 pm

    See yeast is not as scary as you though it was, huh?
    Congratulations on your first challenge. All of your goodies look wonderful!!

  16. #
    16
    Deborah — November 27, 2007 at 6:07 pm

    You did such a wonderful job on your first challenge!! Especially with accidentally adding the larger amount of potatoes.

  17. #
    17
    kitten — November 27, 2007 at 7:19 pm

    I loved your step by step photos and your bread looks divine. Great job in telling the yeast who’s boss !!

  18. #
    18
    Gretchen Noelle — November 27, 2007 at 8:19 pm

    Your bread looks great. I loved your post…funny and detailed! You succeeded with using yeast – great job! Congrats on your first DB challenge!

  19. #
    19
    Julie — November 27, 2007 at 9:33 pm

    Hey, your breads look great! Thank goodness your first challenge with us wasn’t baked yeast jello … gross. Anyway, your rolls especially look nice and tender torn in half, just crying for butter. Job well done!

  20. #
    20
    marias23 — November 28, 2007 at 4:53 am

    Congrats on your first challenge! Carrying heavy baking ingredients lets you burn calories so you can enjoy your creations! Yippee!

  21. #
    21
    chronicler — November 28, 2007 at 3:29 pm

    Your bread turned out perfect! and the pictorial post is an added bonus! Super first challenge!

  22. #
    22
    Gabi — November 28, 2007 at 11:43 pm

    Glad you showed that yeast who is boss!
    Nice job and good for you for getting right to it!
    xoxo
    Gabi

  23. #
    23
    Dolores — November 29, 2007 at 3:26 am

    Congratulations and welcome. It lookw from here like you successfully tamed the yeast beast! And thanks for the measuring-cup-in-the-colander tip!

  24. #
    24
    Bev and Ollie "O" — November 29, 2007 at 11:39 am

    your bread looks great, your slashes on the loaf are so perfect!

  25. #
    25
    Christina — December 1, 2007 at 1:33 am

    I must say, for someone who is fearful of yeast you really came out on top and produced both a stellar loaf and rolls. Great job!

    Welcome to the DBers!

    Christina ~ She Runs, She Eats

  26. #
    26
    creampuff — December 2, 2007 at 6:06 pm

    What a success story! From the storm to conquering of yeast … you did it all! Way to go on your first challenge!

  27. #
    27
    Claire — December 3, 2007 at 12:24 am

    This dough looks like it makes a REALLY good loaf. Welcome to DB’s! Nice job.

Leave a Comment