Lemon Meringue Ice Cream Pie in Toasted Pecan Crust

Happy Easter!
         and
Happy Passover!


This recipe has been on my radar a long time. It was originally on the cover of the April 2007 issue of Bon Appetite Magazine via their  RSVP column and the recipe came from  Jamie's Restaurant in Pensacola, FL. I tore out the recipe, stuck it in my file and finally got around to making it last Easter. My little bunnies were very happy floating in the meringue and my guests were very happy to dig into this pie!
Susan from Savoring Time in the Kitchen posted the same pie last summer and she noted what a great summer dessert this was. I agree. To save time you can use store bought lemon curd and ice cream. The crust is fabulous.

Lemon Meringue Ice Cream Pie in Toasted Pecan Crust
Bon Appétit  | April 2007 

Ingredients:
Crust:
1 1/2 cups finely chopped pecans
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
3 cups vanilla bean ice cream
Meringue:
3 large egg whites
Pinch of cream of tartar
5 tablespoons sugar
Lemon Curd; recipe follows if you want to make your own

Method:
Make the curd according to instructions and chill for a few hours to firm up.
Preheat oven to 400. Mix the pecans, sugar and butter together until moistened. Press the pecan mixture on the bottom and up the sides of a 9” diameter glass pie dish, the mixture will be crumbly. Bake until the crust is slightly toasted, about 12 minutes. The crust will have slipped down the sides, use the back of a spoon to press it back in to place. Cool and then freeze the crust for 30 minutes.
Dollop 1 1/2 Cups of the softened ice cream over the crust, and spread into an even layer. Spread lemon curd over the ice cream and freeze until firm. About 1 1/2 hours. Dollop the remaining ice cream over the lemon curd, and freeze again. You can do this in advance and finish it with meringue when ready to serve.
Preheat oven to 500. To make the meringue, beat the egg whites with an electric mixer until frothy, add the pinch of cream of tartar and gradually add the sugar while mixer is running. Beat until stiff peaks form. Spread the meringue on top of the pie in an even layer. Place the pie in the oven until meringue is golden in spots, about 3-4 minutes. You could use a butane torch as an alternative if you own one. Cut and serve immediately.

Meyer Lemon Curd
Recipe from David Lebovitz
Ingredients:
1/2 cup fresh Meyer lemon juice
1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
6 tablespoons butter
pinch of salt

Method:
Place a mesh strainer over a bowl, and set aside.
In a medium saucepan, whisk together the lemon juice, sugar, egg yolks, eggs, and salt.
Add the butter cubes and set the pan over low heat, whisking constantly until the butter is melted.
Increase the heat a VERY LITTLE bit and cook over moderate heat, whisking constantly, until the mixture thickens and just begins to become jelly-like. It’s done when you lift the whisk and the mixture holds its shape when it falls back into the saucepan from the whisk. For me, this took about ten minutes in a 12” pan.
Immediately press the curd through the strainer. Once strained, store the lemon curd in the refrigerator.

Gourmet's 50 Women Game Changers in Food: # 42, Harumi Kurihara

Harumi Kurihara was born in 1947 in Shimoda City in Shizuoka Prefecture, a coastal city in Japan. As a child, she watched her mother in the kitchen so acquired cooking skills naturally without having to make much effort. 

In 1973, she married Reiji Kurihara, who was a TV newscaster. During her marriage, they often had visitors from the TV industry and Harumi used to cook for them. One of them asked Harumi to work for a TV program and in 1983 for the first time she started to work as an assistant for a cooking TV show. 
In 1989, six years after she started working, she published her first cookbook “Kondate ga 10 Bai ni Naru Tare no Hon” (“A book on various kinds of sauces to enjoy your dish in 10 versions”). This book was highly praised and many cookbooks followed. During her 20-year career as a cooking writer, she has published 115 books with a total number of copies printed exceeding 22 million and has introduced more than 4,000 original recipes. In February 2005, her first English cookbook, “Harumi’s Japanese Cooking,” was published  and was named the best in the World Asian Cuisine Book 2004 and also won the Best Cookbook of 2004 in the 10th Gourmand World Cookbook Awards, known in the culinary world as “the Oscar for Cookbooks”. 

In addition, she began publishing the quarterly recipe magazine “Suteki Recipe” (“Nice Recipe”), the first personal magazine in Japan and one that has introduced her lifestyle as well as her cooking. The total number of issues published in 13 years has reached 52, which is unusually large for a personal magazine published in Japan. It introduces cooking recipes as well as interiors, gardening, and other things to make your life enjoyable. 
Harumi Kurihara has become one of the best-known cooking writers in Japan. Her recipes are full of her original ideas and are loved by many people of all generations. 

She also runs “share with Kurihara harumi” shops (55 branches in Japan) dealing with her original tableware, kitchen items, interior goods, aprons (she has designed over 100 aprons during her career), and clothes and manages “Yutori no Kukan” restaurants and “Café Yutori no Kukan” cafés (a total of 13 restaurants and cafes in Japan). 
The recipes she has introduced over the years have come out of her love for her family and her wish “to make delicious meals for them.”  Harumi has never stopped being a “shufu” (housewife), even after she became busy as a cooking writer. She has always tried to introduce her recipes from the viewpoint of an ordinary housewife. Her recipes can be made using leftover food in the refrigerator or ingredients that everyone has in the kitchen. 
Kurihara has often been called the "Martha Stewart of Japan". Great Britain has Nigella and Delia, we have Martha Stewart and Australia looks to Donna Hay. Japan, in turn, has its own domestic goddess – Harumi Kurihara. 

Speaking through a translator, Ms. Kurihara said she thinks of dishes as belonging to one of three flavor families: soy, salt and mayonnaise. (The mayonnaise, spiked with rice vinegar and soy sauce, provides a creaminess that traditional Japanese dishes rarely have.) 
In addition "there is no Japanese cooking without myoga," Ms. Kurihara said, picking up a graceful shallotlike bulb that is related to ginger. 

Harumi is by all accounts unassuming, encouraging and actually still cooks dinner for her husband. She says: "There are lots of little happinesses to be found in everyday life." 

                                                                                                *************************************

Luckily, I already owned the above cookbook because I was short of time this week and needed a quick and easy recipe. This one fit the bill...quick to make and absolutely delicious. The teriyaki sauce is thick and scrumptious. I made them stove-top, but you'll love these made on the grill this summer. It'd be great as meatballs too. I mixed pork and beef in the little burgers, but you don't have to. Be sure to load on the sauce before serving.

Japanese Tsukune with Teriyaki Sauce
From Everyday Harumi by Harumi Kuihara

Ingredients:

small onion, peeled

1 stalk celery

5 ounces ground beef

5 ounces ground pork

salt and pepper

1 medium egg

2 tablespoons flour

5-6 basil leaves

For the sauce:

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/2 cup mirin

4 tablespoons superfine sugar

Vegetable oil for frying

Shichimi togarashi or chili pepper, sansho (or szechwan Pepper) and sudachi wedges (or lemon)

Method:

To make the sauce: Combine soy sauce, mirin and sugar and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat and simmer for about 20 minutes until thickened. Set aside.

For the tsukune:  roughly chop the onion, remove any stringy parts of the celery and chop it roughly.

Add all the remaining ingredients except basil and knead to combine well. Chop the basil and add right before cooking.

Shape the mixture into rounds about 2 inches in diameter. Drizzle a little oil in a pan and heat. When hot, add the tsukune and cook until nicely browned on both sides.

While still hot, dip them in the teriyaki sauce and sprinkle with shichimi togarashi and sansho, according to your own preference. Serve with sudachi or lemon wedges and rice on the side.

Join Mary from One Perfect Bite and all the other participants in this fun series.

Val - More Than Burnt Toast
Joanne - Eats Well With Others
Taryn - Have Kitchen Will Feed
Susan - The Spice Garden
Claudia - A Seasonal Cook in Turkey
Heather - girlichef
Miranda - Mangoes and Chutney
Jeanette - Healthy Living
April - Abby Sweets 
Katie - Making Michael Pollan Proud
Mary - One Perfect Bite
Viola - The Life is Good Kitchen
Sue - The View from Great Island
Kathleen Van Bruinisse - Bake Away with Me 
Kathleen - Gonna Want Seconds
Martha - Lines from Linderhof
Amy - Beloved Green
Linda - Ciao Chow Linda

Nancy - Picadillo
Mireya - My Healthy Eating Habits
Veronica - My Catholic Kitchen
Annie - Lovely Things

Claudia - Journey of An Italian Cook
Alyce - More Time at the Table
Amrita - Beetles Kitchen Escapades
Martha - Simple Nourished Living
Jill - Saucy Cooks
Sarah - Everything in the Kitchen Sink

Sophie Dahl's Elderflower Jelly

I've always been intrigued with gelées like Sophie's; I've already posted three: one with port wine and fruit (a really old one from the 50's, served to us by a bachelor friend), one with passion fruit and a basil creme and another with prosecco and elderflower liqueur. I also remember posting something about the molds, which are so important with these simple, clear gelées. They have to be gorgeous. I wish I owned some prettier ones. I'm going to keep my eyes open at the antique malls. There are a few lovely old ones pictured in some older issues of Gourmet. Years ago, I scanned one table with two gelées...it was a summer tea. Would you look at the shape of those molds!

And then more recently, while researching Elena Arzak for our game-changer series, I came across Lorraine's post about the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival, where she had taken two master classes. One was with  Elena Arzak and the other with two young men named Harry Parr and Sam Bompas who were big into glamorous gelées. The photos gave me lots of gelée-making inspiration, but I thought I'd post this unpretentious one, perfect for a refreshing summer dessert.
I served it with sweetened whipped cream and a cookie. The recipe calls for elderflower cordial, but I used St. Germain elderflower liqueur, which I already had in my pantry. 

The difference between cordials and liqueurs are 1) the items used to make them and 2) their flavor. Cordials are made from fruits. They are sweeter than liqueurs. Examples of cordials are Chambord, which is a black raspberry cordial, and Grand Marnier, which is an orange cordial. You can use them in fruity desserts and drinks. You could use either of these in this recipe.
Liqueurs are made from nuts, herbs, spices and/or seeds. You can use them in coffees, sweets and savory foods with complimentary tastes. Well-known liqueurs include Amaretto (made from almonds), Kahlua (coffee-flavored liqueur) and Jagermeister (made from herbs).

The St. Germain I used has a more robust flavor, but is not as sweet as an elderflower cordial, which is why I suggest serving it with a sweetened whipped cream, or you could add a bit of superfine sugar to the warm liquid. At any rate, you will need to taste as you want the mixture to be fairly strong and ever so slightly sweet. I added more liqueur than the recipe calls for; even Sophie suggested you might wish to do so.

Elderflower Jelly
From Miss Dahl's Voluptuous Delights by Sophie Dahl

Ingredients:
2 envelopes Knox's unflavored gelatin (double check fluid to gelatin ratio if you add more liqueur; usually it's one envelope to every two cups liquid. Sophie's recipe called for 1 "packet", which may be a different quantity in Great Britain than 1 envelope. At any rate, this recipe required 2 envelopes, which yielded a gelatin that was soft, but held together nicely.)
1/2 cup hot water
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons elderflower cordial (I added at least another 1/4 cup more of the liqueur)
2 cups cold water

Method:
Add 1/2 cup cold water to the gelatin to soften and then heat on the stove until dissolved.
In another bowl, mix the the cordial with the 2 cups cold water (and superfine sugar if you wish; I didn't), tasting to make certain it is strong enough. You'll be able to tell. Add the gelatin and pour into a pretty mold. (I sprayed it with Pam first)
Place in refrigerator to set (a few hours or overnight), unmold by holding the mold in hot water for 10 seconds and then turn it out on a pretty cake dish.
Serve with sweetened whipped cream.