Whether a sweet or savory dish, I really love the punch that the tartness of citrus adds. I think there is something so wonderful about the combination or sweet and tart in a dessert like this Strawberry Key Lime Pie. Key lime pie is actually one of the simplest desserts you can make, there are only a handful of ingredients and is nearly effortless. The special twist here is the addition of STRAWBERRY! The crust is just melted butter and graham cracker crumbs. The filling is low fat sweetened condensed milk, egg yolks, key lime juice {fun story on that in a minute} and freeze dried strawberries. A bit of fresh whipped cream and lime zest pretties up this pie wonderfully. The result is spectacular and is quite the refreshing dessert!!!
I’ve made key lime pie many times and love it but I wanted to do something a little bit different, so the idea of adding strawberry to the mix came about. Now using fresh strawberries I knew wouldn’t work because it would add far too much liquid, so how does one add great strawberry flavor? Freeze dried strawberries are the perfect addition not only for the taste but that very pretty color.
Now for the lime juice… I’ve always used Nellie & Joes Key Lime Juice found in the grocery stores but could not for the life of me find it this time around. I have no idea what the explanation is but I was determined to make this for our family 4th of July BBQ so I bought a bag of limes and got to squeezing. Not the exact same flavor as a key lime but it worked out just fine aside from my hand cramping from all the juicing {yes, thats a lot of juice, I made a couple of these pies and still had extra juice… great to add some flavor to your drinking water!}.
Ingredients
- 1 stick unsalted butter, melted
- 2 cups graham cracker crumb
- 1 can low fat sweetened condensed milk
- 4 egg yolks
- 1/2 cup key lime juice {or fresh squeezed lime juice}
- 1 1/2- 2 oz freeze dried strawberries
- whipped cream
- lime zest
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.
- In a bowl stir together the melted butter and graham cracker crumbs. Press evenly into a 10 inch pie pan, including up the sides.
- Pop the pie onto a baking sheet and into the oven. Bake the crust for about 10 minutes.
- Add the freeze dried strawberries into a food processor with just a tsp of water. Pulse until a fine powder.
- In a bowl stir together the egg yolks, sweetened condensed milk, lime juice and strawberry powder.
- Pour the mixture into the pie dish and bake for about 15 minutes or until set. It will set a little further as it cools.
- You can use store bought whipped cream to decorate or make your own. Its really simple to make your own. A small container of whipping cream, a couple tsp of vanilla extract and about 1/4- 1/3 cup powdered sugar. Whip with a hand mixer until stiff peaks have formed.
- Finish off with fresh lime zest.
Cynthia
I love the idea of adding strawberry to the pie. Looks delicious. Thank you for linking at the In and Out of the Kitchen Link Party. Hope to see you again next week.
Angela LeMoine
Thanks so much for stopping by & hosting! Hope you have a great rest of the weekend!
Rachel
Key lime pie is one of my all time favorite desserts. And I love strawberries. I am going to have to try this, pinning.
Angela LeMoine
Thanks so much Rachel! Hope you enjoy this version as much as we did! Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
Lawrence A Gatti
I have been making strawberry pies and key lime pies this summer and had a little left over ingredients so I tried this easy recipe and was truly delighted with how well the two flavors are balanced and enhance each other. I used a saltine cracker crust for fun but otherwise followed the directions to the letter and it worked perfectly.
Angela LeMoine
That’s so great to hear!!! So happy you enjoyed it. A saltine crust sounds VERY fun!!