Lemon Chess Pie Recipe

Slice of lemon chess pie on a scalloped plate with silver fork

4.93 from 14 votes

Lemon Chess Pie Recipe is an easy old fashioned chess pie recipe! This southern pie is one of the best pies ever with a creamy lemon filling. You can even make mini pies with this recipe!

Prep Time15

Cook Time40

Total Time55

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Servings: servings

Calories: 339kcal

Author: Dorothy Kern

Cost: $10

Ingredients

1 9-inch pie crust
¼ cup (57g) unsalted butter , melted
1 ½ cups (300g) granulated sugar
4 large eggs
1 tablespoon (8g) all purpose flour
1 tablespoon cornmeal
¼ cup (59ml) lemon juice
¼ cup (59ml) milk
1 tablespoon lemon zest
¼ teaspoon salt

Instructions

Place pie crust in a 9-inch pie plate and chill at least 1 hour or freeze at least 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 425°F.
Line the pie crust with parchment paper and fill with pie weights. Bake 10 minutes. Remove from oven, carefully remove pie weights.
While the pie crust is pre-baking, whisk together butter, sugar, and eggs. Whisk in flour, cornmeal, lemon juice, milk, zest and salt.
Pour mixture into prepared crust. Top crust with a pie shield or strips of foil. Place pie on a baking sheet.
Bake at 350° until pie is golden on top and wiggles just a teeny bit in the center, about 35-40 minutes.
Cool completely before slicing. Store in refrigerator. Serve room temperature plain, or with whipped cream or ice cream.

Notes

The baking instructions as written are for my homemade crust recipe. The all butter crust takes a bit longer to pre-bake (or bake in general) than a store bought crust.
If you're using a Pillsbury or similar store bought crust, you can start the oven at 425°F and just fill your pie, bake it 10 minutes at the high temperature and lower the oven temp to 350°F. If the pie starts to get too brown on top, tent it with foil.
You know the pie is done baking when it's light golden on top, slightly puffed, and only wiggles a little when the pie plate is tapped (if it rolls when tapped it's not done in the center).

Nutrition