Shaker Lemon Pie

12 servings
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 50 minutes
Lemon Mixture Resting Time 12 hours
Total Time 13 hours 5 minutes

Shaker Lemon Pie is the best spring pie with a lemony custard perfect for Easter! Easy pie recipe using whole lemons, sugar, and eggs in a flaky pie crust. 

Fresh fruit pies like Blueberry Pie are the perfect dessert to serve as spring flowers start blooming. There are so many beautiful and delicious Pie Recipes that would make perfect Easter desserts.

Shaker Lemon Pie slice on plate

SHAKER LEMON PIE

Also known as an Ohio Lemon Pie, Shaker Lemon Pie is an old fashioned pie recipe from a time where being frugal was a way of life for most Midwestern families. Using whole lemons and few everyday pantry items like eggs and sugar, they were able to have a rich yet simple pie all spring long.

Shaker Lemon Pie is a bright citrus pie bursting with lemony goodness and has a texture that’s like a cross between lemon curd and marmalade. This Shaker Lemon Pie recipe use just sugar, lemons, eggs, and a bit of flour. Other pie recipes add melted butter, but this recipe is closer to the original Ohio Shaker simplistic traditions.

This sweet and tart Shaker Lemon Pie is perfect for spring gatherings, picnics, and will look beautiful on an Easter table. It’s light and refreshing, which after a heavy meal is just what you need! Serve warm Shaker Lemon Pie with homemade Whipped Cream or Vanilla Ice Cream for the best spring dessert!

Many Shaker Lemon Pie recipes use a double crust, but this version allows you to see the gorgeous thinly sliced lemon filling. After filling your pie crust, use small tongs to neatly arrange the top lemon slices in a more circular pattern for a prettier pie. Crimp pie crust edges and brush with egg whites to give them crunch and shine.

Shaker Lemon Pie lemons in sugar

Old fashioned Shaker Lemon Pie takes a little bit of prep work but the beautiful, fresh lemony flavor that you get is so worth it. For the softest lemon rinds, let the sliced lemons sit in the sugar for at least 12 hours and up to a whole day. Stir the lemon sugar mixture occasionally and pick out any seeds. 

MORE DELICIOUS, CLASSIC FRUIT PIES

HOW TO MAKE SHAKER LEMON PIE

  • Prepare the lemons: Use a mandoline slicer to get really thin lemon slices. If you freeze your lemons ahead of time, you can get your lemon slices super thin. Remember to give your lemon rinds time to fully soften in the sugar – be patient and don’t rush your filling.
  • Pre-bake the crust: Blind bake your bottom crust before filling. Cover entire unfilled crust with foil and weigh down with dried beans and bake at 425 degrees for 10 minutes. 
  • Baking the pie: To keep your pie crust from burning, either tent the pie with tin foil halfway through baking or create a foil ring to cover the pie crust edges.

Shaker Lemon Pie in pie plate, unbaked

VARIATIONS ON SHAKER LEMON PIE

    • Meyer Lemons: Use the lemon-mandarin hybrid, Meyer Lemons when they are in season (they are much cheaper in season). These special lemons are a bit sweeter, so you may not need as much sugar depending on your sweet tooth. 
    • Brown Sugar: Replace 1 cup sugar with 1 cup light brown sugar to give a sweeter, caramel flavor to the lemon mixture.
    • Blackberries: Blackberries and blueberries go so well with lemons. Top your pie with a blackberry simple syrup or fold in a handful of fresh berries to your lemony filling.
    • Ginger: Add some grated or thinly sliced fresh ginger to your lemon mixture while it sits overnight to give your Shaker Lemon Pie a spicy, gingery flavor.
    • Orange Pie: Make a Shaker Orange Pie by replacing the lemons with oranges with thin rinds. If the rinds are too thick, try zesting the oranges before thinly slicing.
    • Double Crust Pie: To make a double crust Shaker Lemon Pie, use an additional pie crust and cut steam vents into the top crust. Bake at 450 for the first 15 minutes, reduce to 375 degrees and bake for another 20-25 minutes.

DELICIOUS FRUIT DESSERTS:

HOW TO STORE SHAKER LEMON PIE

  • Serve: Shaker Lemon Pie is best served at room temperature and can be kept out for up to 2 hours.
  • Store: Cover your Shaker Lemon Pie tightly with plastic wrap or foil and refrigerate for up to 4 days. Bring to room temperature by setting on the counter for 15-20 minutes.
  • Freeze: Make sure pie is completely cooled before freezing. Tightly cover and seal in an airtight container and freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight.

Ohio Shaker Lemon Pie baked in pie plate top-down

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Shaker Lemon Pie

Shaker Lemon Pie is the best spring pie with a lemony custard perfect for Easter! Easy pie recipe using whole lemons, sugar, and eggs in a flaky pie crust.
Yield 12 servings
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 50 minutes
Total Time 13 hours 5 minutes
Course Dessert
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder

Ingredients
 

  • 2 medium lemons
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 pie crust
  • 4 large eggs
  • 2 tablespoons flour

Instructions

  • Trim the ends of your lemons until you can see the flesh. You don't want to use the ends in the pie.
  • Slice the lemons as thinly as you can, a mandoline slicer is best for this.
  • If you want an easier to slice pie, you can coarsely chop the thin lemon slices.
  • Mix the lemons with sugar and let sit overnight (12 hours is even better).
  • Pre-heat your oven to 375 degrees.
  • Prepare a pie plate with the pie crust.
  • Mix the lemon mixture with the eggs and flour.
  • Pour it evenly into the pie crust and bake for 45-50 minutes (cover with foil if your pastry or the tops of the lemons are browning too much).

Nutrition

Calories: 231kcal | Carbohydrates: 43g | Protein: 4g | Fat: 6g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Cholesterol: 70mg | Sodium: 85mg | Potassium: 65mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 34g | Vitamin A: 102IU | Vitamin C: 10mg | Calcium: 18mg | Iron: 1mg
Keyword: Shaker Lemon Pie

Shaker Lemon Pie collage

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

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Comments

  1. Loved how this came out! It is bright, bitter, tart and sweet.
    If you like bitter orange marmalade (the British sort, with lots of chewy peel), than this pie is for you. If you do not, than avoid it and stick with lemon meringue.
    The bit of flour ensured it sliced well, and was not runny like other versions. I had more than enough filling for my pie tin with the amounts from the recipe.
    For best success, you will want the lemons slices as micro thin as possible (many recommend mandolins) and then, at minimum, quartered (leaving the rounds whole makes for messy cutting and eating, since every bite would pull a full lemon circle out). Chopping the rounds up would be better.
    I was lazy and cheated, by dumping the lemons in a blender to grind down into shreds. I left them and the sugar in the blender to macerate, and then mixed the eggs and flour in the next day using the blender as well. Super, super easy.
    This pie is best served warmed up. It goes well with vanilla ice cream.
    Some nice additions would be a teaspoon or less of vanilla to the lemon mixture (it weirdly works), and I like adding that crunchy “sparkle” sugar to the crust. It just makes a nice texture contrast to the chewy peel and flaky crust.

  2. This recipe is a lot of work for something I don’t believe can turn out right given the procedures. I’ve made tons of pies in my day, and I knew there wasn’t going to be enough filling with just two lemons. I don’t see how you can use the amounts given and come up with enough filling for even an 8″ pie. I used 3 lemons, 2 1/2 c. white sugar and 1/4 c. brown. I used an extra egg. It was exactly enough to fill a 9″ pie pan. Next, I sliced the lemons when extremely cold, and did them as thin as you can do by hand, and they were macerated for 24 hours instead of 12. Some recipes say you can go up to three days! But still, even with that and slicing very thin, then baking for 56 minutes, it was very unpleasant to bite into the rind! The overall flavor without the rind and it’s bitterness, was good. I also beat the eggs for a full five minutes before adding the flour and then turning into lemon mixture. I won’t make again, but if I did, I’d just use the zest of 4 lemons and then the lemon pulp and juice and leave out the rind entirely. It might just be good that way. I also used an extra tbsp. of flour to offset the extra lemon and egg. I think these amounts were spot on, but for heaven’s sake, leave out the rind! Be sure to cover the whole top halfway through or the top will burn.

    I honestly don’t know how anyone can give a recipe five stars when they admit they haven’t even made it! I love the idea of the recipe and the simple ingredients, but I personally would not go to the trouble again…there are better lemon recipes out there!

  3. I’ve never been to OH, so I don’t know what this is supposed to taste like. I decided to make it because my husband is watching the Cincinnati Bangals on TV. Well, I added blueberries and there is something delicious about this pie, but the egg smell is strong and not good. It’s weird though because I like flan, and flan has a lot of egg. A professional chef told me that flan has to be cooked in a water bath or you end up with scrambled eggs. Not sure if that would help here.

  4. The pie is quite good, but the recipe is incomplete and contradicts instructions found elsewhere. Steps five and six instruct us to pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees, then prepare a pie plate with the pie crust. But tucked away in an earlier part of this page are instructions to pre-bake the crust at 425 degrees. The recipe itself needs to be reorganized and amplified so that all needed information is in one place. (And please add your answer to the person who asked if the macerating lemons should be in the fridge or on the counter.)

    1. Hello, I’m glad you enjoyed your Shaker Lemon Pie!

      as for the confusion with the different baking times, the recipe calls for baking the pre-bake crust to be cooked for ten minuets at 425. However, in the blog of this recipe, if you scroll to the “Variations on Shaker Lemon Pie” you have a double crust option. This options calls for you to make a double crust Shaker Lemon Pie, use an additional pie crust and cut steam vents into the top crust. Bake at 450 for the first 15 minutes, reduce to 375 degrees and bake for another 20-25 minutes.

      hope this explains and clears up any confusion! Thank you!

  5. Sabrina, should the lemons and sugar sit overnight on the counter top or in the refrigerator?

  6. I haven’t gotten to make it yet, but plan to do so for Pi Day this weekend. Question: do you think I could leave the lemons and sugar from Friday until Sunday? ? Excited to try it!! Thanks!

    1. I am so sorry the comment got lost, I am just seeing this tonight. I am sure the recipe has long been cooked/or not but I still want to try to help.

      Stephanie, leaving the lemons in the sugar for more than 12 hours could break down the lemon and could affect the texture of the pie. Hope it still turned out okay!

  7. Love anything lemon and this is something I must try! Thanks for adding the different variations too! Great recipe.