Our ancient ancesters knew wild raspberries well. Various dig sites across Europe, Asia, and Northern America have revealed the remains of raspberry canes.
In Greek myths, raspberries were white until Ida, Zeus’s nursemaid pricked her finger and stained them all red for all time, linking raspberries to fertility, women’s health and children. That tale is honoured in Raspberry’s Latin name, Rubus idaeus, which means “bramble bush of Ida.”
Lemons are believed to have first come to common use in India and China, popular for it’s ability to combat scurvy which long distance sailors needed. It can also act as a short term preservative. Drinking lemon water aids the proper digestion of food and absorption of nutrients, however long term use is damaging to tooth enamel.
This light, quick and refreshingly tart filling is a summer treat, especially if there are prepared tart shells to pull from the freezer.
You will need:
1 pie shell pre-baked ( pastry or graham wafer )
3 Tbsp. ground or finely chopped nuts
1 lemon, juice and zest
1/2 packette unflavoured gelatine
2/3 – 3/4 cups fresh raspberries ( reserve enough fresh berries to decorate)
1/4 cup plain cream cheese
1 1/4 cups whipping cream
1/2 – 2/3 cups sifted icing sugar (sweeten to taste)
1 potion of a drop of yellow food colouring (optional)
Begin with a shift of your thoughts. Bring them into the present moment and allow the nigglies to fall away with the warm water as you wash your hands. Put on an apron as a way to separate then with now and welcome the compassionate spirits into your kitchen. Deep breaths and …begin.
Cover the bottom of the prebaked pie shell with the nuts. The nuts create a separation barrier between the pie shell and the filling, keeping the bottom crisper longer. Put aside.
Wash a lemon and zest the rind before juicing the lemon. Doing this at room temperature will give more juice and rolling the lemon on the counter with your hands before cutting and juicing will help break the cells inside and giving even more juice.
Sprinkle the gelatin over the lemon juice. There should be about 1/4 cup of juice from one lemon. Let sit so the gelatin can soften. Stir and heat gently until dissolved. Allow to cool but not thicken. It needs to be liquid when whipped into the whipping cream.
Using a hand mixer, wand or blender whip the raspberries and cream cheese together. I kept a dozen berries aside to decorate the top of the pie. Once combined put into a separate dish and wash the beaters for round two.
Whip the whipping cream until soft peaks begin to form and add in the sifted icing sugar and lemon zest. Lemon in any form and love go hand in hand. Regular sugar will work as well. It is just that icing sugar will dissolve more quickly. Pour in the lemon/gelatin mixture and continue whipping until stiff. Do not over beat or you will have lemon flavoured sweet butter.
Divide the whipped cream in half and stir in the raspberry mixture to one portion.
To the lemon half, if you would like to, add a VERY small amount of yellow food colouring. Less than a drop to slightly shift the colour of the whipping cream gently off white. Overdoing can look unnatural.
Spoon out enough of the raspberry mixture to cover the bottom of the pie shell with about half an inch of mixture.
Fill a piping bag fitted with a large open star piping tip with both varieties of whipped cream, half on one side and half on the other. It does not need to be perfect and requires a little patience. I use a serving spoon and build up by alternating the sides/colours to keep it all even.
The tricky bit is to keep pressure even when pushing out so that both colours get pushed through together. It is possible you will only get one colour out for the first inch or so. Don’t panic the other colour will come!
Pipe circles around the pie shell starting around the outside and then filling up the inside. You may find that the raspberry added mixture will be a little softer than the lemon only side. That can be solved by putting it in the fridge for 30 minutes, if you have the extra time. Dot with fresh raspberries and cool in the fridge.
If it is really hot outside, consider serving this pie frozen instead of cold. It will need about 20 minutes out of the freezer before decorating and cutting.
Raspberry Lemonade Pie from My Kitchen Wand
