A long time ago, in an internet far, far away, I printed out a recipe for “Lime Fluff Pie.” I ran across it the other day and realized why I printed it out: it has lime, it has fluff, and it’s a desert. Alas, I forgot where I got it from, but a quick search revealed that it came from here.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing there about the background. But I made it today, and it’s really good. You’ll notice that my take on this is a little different.

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups applesauce (a 24-oz jar)
• 1 package (3 oz.) lime jello
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 tbsp. lime juice, freshly squeezed
• 1/8 tsp. grated lime zest
• 1 can evaporated milk, chilled (about 13 oz)
• 2 graham cracker pie crusts, refrigerated, not baked

Instructions

1. Prepare your pie crusts.
2. Pour the evaporated milk into a large bowl and place in the freezer for 15-20 minutes.
3. Zest the lime (1 large or 2-3 small) and chop finely. Juice the limes to get 2 tablespoons of lime juice.
4. Heat the applesauce in a small saucepan to about 140 or 150 degrees, stirring constantly. Add the jello mix and stir to dissolve. Add the sugar, lime zest, and lime juice. Stir until well combined. Remove from heat and allow to cool for 10-15 minutes.
5. Take the evaporated milk out of the freezer. With a mixer, whip it until it is light and fluffy, about five to ten minutes. The trick here is that after about five minutes, it will form small- to medium-sized bubbles, and if you continue to whip it, nothing seems to change. But continue to whip it, and after a while, it will suddenly become lighter and fluffier, and the bubbles will get smaller and smaller until it is light and fluffy. It won’t be exactly like whipped cream, so once you get to this stage, you are done.
6. Gently pour in the applesauce mixture and, using a spatula, gently fold the two together until you have a homogenous mixture. You will have a very thin batter, something akin to a good crepe batter.
7. Pour it into the two pie crusts. I find a ladle works best for this, because this recipe makes enough for two pies, and it’s a fairly thin filling.
8. Refrigerate at least four hours, or preferably overnight. These do freeze well, but they taste even better frozen, so freezing them is no guarantee that they will last longer.

Yeah, that’s it. It’s pretty simple, and because there’s no baking involved, it’s a good summer desert. If you need to serve this for lunch or later, make it the day before, pop it in the freezer overnight, and then put it in the refrigerator first thing in the morning.

I’m pretty sure that you can also make this lemon flavored just by replacing all the lime ingredients with lemon ingredients.

I took this over to my parents’ house, and they loved it. My mother and I even speculated about doing a strawberry version of this, by substituting strawberry jello for the lime jello, and strawberry puree for half the applesauce. I’m not sure what to do about the lime zest and lime juice in this case. I think strawberry extract might work, but I hate those things. My thought is that if the strawberries are fresh and ripe enough, you wouldn’t need to worry about it. If I figure it out, I’ll post it here.

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