Redcurrant Meringue Pie

What do you usually do with redcurrants? I always make some redcurrant jelly, and redcurrant juice makes excellent cordial. But there aren't too many redcurrant cake recipes in my cake repertoire, I must admit. I had a recipe for a redcurrant meringue pie that I had picked up several years ago from one of the supermarket recipe stands (Selver, in this case). Several readers of my Estonian site had praised it, but I didn't get around to making it until last week. As usual, I changed some quantities and tweaked the procedure, and was very pleased with the resulting meringue pie. The ruby redcurrants add a lovely spark, the sweet meringue and the slightly sour filling are an excellent match as well.

Redcurrant Meringue Pie
(Beseekattega punasesõstrakook)
Serves 6 to 8



Pastry:
130 g plain/all-purpose flour (250 ml/1 cup)
30 g oats (100 ml)
2 Tbsp sugar
125 cold butter, cut into cubes
2 Tbsp cold water

Filling:
250 g sour cream
3 Tbsp caster sugar
grated zest of half a lemon
150 g redcurrants, cleaned (1 cup)
1 Tbsp potato starch or cornflour

Meringue topping:
2 large egg whites
85 g caster sugar (100 ml)

Pastry: mix the dry ingredients, add cubed butter and pulse couple of times, until the mixture is fine and crumbly. Add the water, pulse again briefly. Press the mixture into a dough, then use your fingers and press the dought into a 26 cm pie dish.
Place to rest in a fridge for 30 minutes, then blind bake at 200 C for 15 minutes.
Reduce the heat to 175 Celsius.
Mix sour cream, sugar and grated lemon zest, spread on pre-baked pie base.
Gently mix potato starch/cornflour with the cleaned redcurrants and sprinkle on top of the cream layer.
Whisk egg whites and sugar until thick and white, then spread over the filling (or, for an even prettier effect, use a piping bag).
Bake at 175 C oven for about 15 minutes, until the meringue is light golden brown.