I have made Roses lemon meringue pie before with great results, but this time my meringue didn’t turn out very well.  When I first made the pie it was beautiful, light and fluffy and was nice a high on the pie.  I made it Friday afternoon and by Saturday evening the meringue shrunk down to maybe a 1/2 an inch above the pie.  It also started getting water droplets on it about an hour after I had made it.  Any suggestions as to why this happened?

Of course I made this pie to take to my in-laws for dinner on Saturday. And the funny thing was that nobody cared about the meringue.  There was no pie left by the time we went home.  Everyone loved the filling and the crust.  I should have just scraped off the meringue and had an open faced lemon meringue pie. 

Sounds like it was well-appreciated!

Disclaimer: I haven’t yet made this pie.  From looking at the recipe, it seems like the hot sugar syrup (for the Italian meringue), baking and then broiling should all conspire to make a very stable meringue.

Did you spread it so that it was anchored on (touching) the crust?

Editing to say that I’ve seen your Show & Tell, and it looks like you did anchor it on the crust.  Did you use cream of tartar?  Overbeat?  You did make the Italian Meringue version, right?

Yes, I used cream of tartar and it was the italian meringue version.  I don’t think that I overbeated it, but I could be wrong.  But I thought that the cream of tartar would prevent overbeating.  I’m stumped.  Oh well, it gives me another excuse to make this pie again.

I wonder if it was more humid that day than the last time I made it.

Now that you mention humidity, I was reviewing Rose’s mousseline video recently and she remarks that it isn’t best to make it on a humid day.  So maybe you’re right?

Liza - 13 February 2011 09:43 AM

It also started getting water droplets on it about an hour after I had made it.  Any suggestions as to why this happened?

Now that I’ve made this, I read up on it- Shirley Corriher says that beading comes from overbaking- the proteins get a little too done and shrink up at bit, expelling a little moisture in the process, which forms the little beads.  With such a short time in the oven, though, I wonder just how many seconds elapse between fully baked and overbaked?

Mine got a few drops on it, but I tried to ignore them.