Cherry Limeade Pie is made with fresh tart pie cherries and lime juice. The juices are cooked into a sweet cherry-lime curd and folded into cream cheese and whipped cream. It is a fresh and fruity take on cherry limeade, one of my favorite drinks.
I am fortunate to have neighbors who have pie cherry trees, as they can be hard to come by. And of course, picked by yours truly. It’s the perfect balance of tart vs. sweet. (Lydia, my friend with the cherry tree, has site where she reviews products. Sometimes she gets some crazy cool stuff, click here to check it out.)
Step 1 of the filling is the cherry-lime curd, similar to Lemon Curd or Orange Curd. It’s basically a one-step process on your stove top. The juices, egg yolks, sugar and cornstarch are all cooked together at once without having to temper the eggs. However, the color of the cherry juice when mixed with egg yolks is a blood orange color. I try so hard not to use food coloring, but as food coloring without scary dyes become more available, it’s a win for me.
Once you have all the creamy whipped goodness mixed with the cherry-lime curd, it’s spread into the crust. Chill and serve! You can spread extra whipped cream over the entire pie, like I did, or piped around the edges. For quick & pretty garnish making lime curls.
Have fun creating your cherry-limeade masterpiece; you will love it! Don’t forget to save that last slice for yourself!
Cherry Limeade Pie
Ingredients
Cherry Limeade Filling
- 2/3 cup pure cane granulated sugar
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- pinch of salt
- Zest of one lime
- 3/4 cup cherry juice (instructions below)
- 1/4 cup lime juice
- 4 large egg yolks (beaten & strain to remove "wiggly" undesirable thing)
- 1 tablespoon butter, cut into pieces
- 8 ounce package, cream cheese, room temp
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup pure cane powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 prepared graham cracker crust
Topping
- 1-1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
- 1/4 cup pure cane powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
Cherry Juice (if making your own)
- Place 3 cups of pitted pie cherries into a saucepan and 1 cup of water. Mash the cherries with a potato masher.
- Place the pan with mashed cherries on stove top over medium-high heat and bring to a boil.
- Lower heat to medium and simmer for about 20 to 30 minutes covered.
- Remove from heat, strain through a fine metal sieve and place in refrigerator to cool.
- Makes about 1-1/2 cups cherry juice.
Cherry Limeade Curd Filling
- In medium size saucepan, stir together the beaten-strained yolks, cornstarch, sugar, cherry & lime juices, lime zest and salt. Stirring with whisk constantly in the sauce pan over medium to medium-high heat, until mixture thickens (about 5-6 minutes).
- Remove pan from heat and stir in butter until melted.
- Pour mixture into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap pressed onto surface of curd to prevent skin from forming. Chill in refrigerator about 2 hours until thoroughly cooled.
Pie Assembly
- With an electric mixer, whip the whipping cream with powdered sugar and vanilla until stiff peaks form (about 5 to 6 minutes), and set aside.
- In a separate bowl, with an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese until creamy (about 1-2 minutes).
- Add the cooled cherry-lime goo to the cream cheese and beat together about 1 minute until thoroughly combined.
- Fold in the whipped cream and spread into prepared pie shell.
Whipped Cream for Topping
- Beat the whipping cream, sugar, vanilla, with an electric mixer until stiff peaks form.
- Spread the whipping cream over the entire surface of the pie and pipe extra around the edges.
Next, add in the cherry and limeade juices to the cream cheese and condensed milk mixture. Stir in the chopped cherries.
That’s a nice idea, adding in chopped cherries, but for me I wanted the filling creamy, no pieces. Let me know if you try that.
So yummy, this is definitely a keeper. Who woulda ever thought of cherry-lime curd except Linda? I’m assuming that you add the cornstarch with the juices and eggs? And also assuming that you don’t need vanilla in the whipped cream that gets combined with the thickened goo, but only for the whipped cream topping. I used a bing-like sweet cherry, and didn’t need any food coloring at all, although it’s probably sweeter than if I’d used pie cherries. Thanks!!❤️🎵
Wow, my mistake! Imagine that! I went through the recipe and fixed those flaws. I do use vanilla in the whipped cream that goes into the filling AND additional vanilla in the topping.
Oh, and yes Dear Kathy…I fixed that mistake too. The cornstarch does get cooked with the curd filling. Sheeze Louise…I know what I do and I keep notes to “keep my head straight” but 2 mistakes this post. SORRY! I would like to say it wouldn’t happen again, but come on, I am not a robot.
I see vanilla listed twice in directions but only listed once in ingredient list for the topping part of pie. Is it to go into pie mixture also? If so, how much vanilla? Also, am I assuming you put cornstarch in mixture that is on stovetop? Thx.