fbpx

I remember being very confused as a child when , while we were all at some wedding, a relative mentioned they were going to the bar to get a cocktail. My only experience with the term “cocktail” at that point had been mixed fruit… and it seemed like a super weird, and fairly lumpy, drink idea.

serving-fruitcocktailmeringue

Now that I’m all grown up, I’m just very confused why this would be put into a pie.

Fruit Cocktail Meringue Pie
Ingredients
  • 1-pound can of fruit cocktail
  • 2 eggs, separated
  • 8-3/4 ounce can of crushed pineapple
  • 1/2 cup water
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup cornstarch
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 1 baked (9-inch) pastry shell
  • 3 drops almond flavoring
Instructions
  1. Drain syrup from fruit cocktail into saucepan. Add egg yolks, pineapple, water and lemon juice. Combine 1/3 cup sugar, cornstach and salt. Mix dry ingredients into syrup mixture. Cook and stir until thickened. Stir in butter and fruit cocktail. Pour into baked pastry shell and cool.
  2. Beat egg whites until foamy; gradually add remaining sugar and almond flavoring and continue beating until soft peaks form. Dollop onto pie. Bake in 350-degree (moderate) oven 5 to 7 minutes until meringue is nicely browned.
3.2.1303

 
recipe-fruitcocktailmeringuepie

What I find funniest about this recipe is that I’ve actually made a fruit cocktail meringue pie before, way back in 2009. And I had completely, utterly forgotten about it — until I Googled for fruit cocktail recipes on my own blog, because I vaguely remembered making something silly and mediocre with fruit cocktail before (turns out that was rainbow fruit sauce, incidentally).

cornstarch

I guess it isn’t terribly surprising that I can’t instantly recall the hundreds of retro recipes that I’ve made at this point, especially something from five years ago.

fruitcocktail

And despite the names, this is a very different pie. Here we’re making a cornstarch pudding filling, which is trickier than relying on gelatin for firmness. (The cornstarch did its job quite nicely, incidentally. When pudding works well, it has a terrific consistency.)

meringue

While making the meringue, I accidentally spilled more than three drops of almond flavoring in — it was more like two dribbles. (Whatever. Just splash some in.)

tasting-bite

“Is this another fruit pie with meringue on top?”

“Yeah, I think that’s the third this month. I guess it was a thing.”

tasting-happy

“Wow, this is really, really good.”

Verdict: Best fruit cocktail use.

From the tasting notes:

All the fruit cocktail elements worked really well in this, and were nice flavor and texture elements in the pudding filling. The almond extract is a great addition to the meringue topping (feel free to use more than three drops). It’s easy, bright, sweet, and has enough fruit that you can pretend it’s healthy!

  |