Some wild hair grabbed me this evening after I made dinner, which sounds gross when you think about it, but in fact the hair told me to make a lemon pie. It's the only thing to do when you're facing down a giant bag of lemons.
I knew I had all of the ingredients for this lemon meringue pie, so I hustled to the pantry and grabbed the supplies. I felt rather impressed with myself as I whisked eggs and lemon juice. Call me Suzy Homemaker. Move Over Martha Stewart.
Then I opened the can of condensed milk. It had expired in June. I called my mother who consulted with my Great Aunt and the consensus was to use it anyway. So I did.
I pulled out my store bought graham cracker crust. I know my grandma swears that homemade graham cracker crusts are the only way to go but I can't be bothered. Unfortunately the crust had expired in 2011. I called my mother again.
"How long have you HAD that in your pantry?"
I felt like the expired crust proved how epic and miraculous this evening's pie making was, but although it only tasted slightly stale, my mother and my aunt were against me. I confided my problem to my husband who trotted off to the store down the street and returned within 10 minutes with a new pie crust (note: I did not let my husband know about the expired condensed milk, I'll take that secret to my grave...or to the Internet. Whatever).
I then proceeded to pour the filling into the stale old pie crust, which I hadn't thrown away. Then I realized my mistake and re-poured it into the new pie crust.
Finally, I pulled the pie out of the oven with a silicon potholder, and those things are slippery. It was either drop the pie or burn my arm and OF COURSE I wasn't going to drop that dang pie.
Then I realized I forgot to add lemon zest.
Q has declared the pie to be delicious, and hopefully expired condensed milk won't kill us, but if it does that's beside the point. The point is, never give up on your dreams.
