Flour power

Lorraine Pascale continues with her mission to make showstopping recipes look simple in her latest collection, BAKE. Pictures by Miles New.

least 10 minutes. Preheat the oven to 160C (fan 140C/325F/gas 3).

Place the biscuit crust in the oven and bake for 10 minutes. When the crust is baked, remove it from the oven and set aside to cool.

Meanwhile, make the filling. Put the egg yolks into a bowl and whisk them a little, then add the condensed milk. Whisk the mixture again until everything is nicely combined. Then add the lime juice and whisk again for a couple of minutes. Taste the mixture – I like to add lime zest to give the flavour a bit more of a kick, but see whether you think it needs it or not.

Put the crust-lined tin onto a baking sheet (this makes it easier to move the tin around) and pour in the filling. Place the pie in the oven and bake for 10–15 minutes, until the filling is just set but has not changed in colour.

When the pie is baked, remove it from the oven and leave it to cool down completely in the tin. When the pie has completely cooled down, make the Swiss meringue by filling a medium pan with 5cm of water and placing it on the hob. Bring the water to the boil over a high heat, and as soon as it is boiling, reduce to a simmer. Meanwhile, put the egg whites and sugar in a heatproof bowl and whisk them up until they become light and frothy.

Put the bowl over the now simmering water and keep whisking all the time until the temperature reaches 70C (160F) on your sugar thermometer. This will take 5–7 minutes. Once it has reached this temperature, remove the meringue from the heat and keep whisking until the mixture has cooled down and has become very thick, glossy and almost marshmallow-like in texture. It will take about 10–15 minutes to do this stage by hand, or once the mixture has reached 50C (121F) you can pop it into the bowl of a stand mixer with a whisk attachment, and whisk at high speed until it is body temperature and stiff peaks have formed – this will take about 6–8 minutes.

To check that it is ready, take some of the meringue on the end of the whisk, then