Key Lime Pie Recipe

 This authentic Key Lime Pie recipe is easy and delicious! It has a buttery graham cracker crust and a sweet-tart creamy filling, bursting with fresh lime flavor.

Table of Contents

• 💚 Traditional Key Lime Pie: This is the Real Deal
• 🧾 What You’ll Need
• Key Lime Pie Recipe
• 📷Photo Tutorial: How To Make Key Lime Pie
• 💭 Variations
• 💡 Tips and FAQs

🧾 What You’ll Need

Ingredients & Substitutions

A few notes on the ingredients you’ll need for this pie. The full list of ingredients and the amounts needed can be found in the recipe card below. (Links are affiliate links and I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases.)

For the Crust

• Graham crackers: You’ll need about 10 rectangular graham crackers to make 6 oz (1 1/2 cups) of crumbs for the graham cracker crust. I love using a homemade graham cracker crust, but you can also use a pre-made graham cracker crust if you prefer.
• Unsalted butter and salt: I like to use unsalted butter when baking so that I can control the amount of salt. If you don’t have unsalted butter, just use salted butter and leave out the rest of the salt called for in the crust.
• Granulated sugar: Adds a touch of sweetness to the crust.

For the Filling and Topping

• Egg yolks: This recipe uses six large egg yolks. Here’s my full guide to separating egg yolks and whites if you need a refresher. Don’t forget to save the egg whites for a future batch of Meringue Cookies or buttercream!
• Sweetened condensed milk: Make sure to use sweetened condensed milk—not evaporated milk or another type of canned milk. The cans may look similar, but they are not the same thing and won’t give you the same results.
• Lime juice: Fresh key lime juice is traditionally used to make this pie, but you can use any limes that you have. You will need about 18-20 key limes ( or 5 large Persian limes) to get 1 cup of juice. To find the juiciest fruit, look for limes that are heavy for their size, and have a little give when you squeeze them. Check out our article on the difference between regular limes vs key limes if you want more information.
• Lime zest: Fresh lime zest adds an extra punch of lime flavor, as well as beautiful specks of green throughout the pie filling.
• Heavy whipping cream: To make the fluffiest, most stable whipped cream, use COLD heavy whipping cream. You can also chill your mixing bowl and beaters to speed up the whipping process.
• Powdered sugar: Helps to thicken and sweeten the topping.

Equipment

• Microplane: You can use a microplane to easily zest the limes. If you don’t have a one, a cheese grater will work as well.
• Juicer: Squeezing by hand works, but you don’t get nearly as much juice out of the limes. I recommend using a countertop juicer to maximize the juice you get out of your fruit.
• Pie pan: Use a 9 x 2″ pie plate for a deep-dish crust that can hold all the filling.
• Piping bag and Star tip: I like these disposable piping bags (I wash them and re-use them to reduce waste!) and used a large star tip (Ateco tip #867) to make the whipped cream rosettes.

📷Photo Tutorial: How To Make Key Lime Pie

Here’s a quick overview of how to make the graham cracker crust and key lime pie filling for this easy Key Lime Pie recipe. Check the recipe card for printable instructions and ingredient measurements. And don’t miss the embedded video!

Make The sweet Graham Cracker Crust

1. Make graham crumbs. Crush 10 graham crackers in a food processor until they are fine crumbs, or put them in a zip-top bag and roll over them with a rolling pin until crushed to make 6 oz (1 1/2 cups) graham cracker crumbs.
2. Mix crumbs, melted butter, sugar and salt. Combine graham cracker crumbs, 3 oz (6 TBSP) melted butter,1 1/2 TBSP granulated sugar, and 1/4 tsp salt in a medium bowl.

3. Stir. Stir everything together until it’s well-combined and has the texture of wet sand.
4. Press into pan. Press the crust mixture evenly on the bottom and up the sides of your pie pan.
5. Bake and cool crust. Bake at 350ºF for 15 minutes. Allow it to cool completely on a wire rack before adding the filling.

Make The Key Lime Pie Filling

1. Zest limes. Zest the fresh key limes with a microplane until you have 2 TBSP of fresh zest.
2. Juice limes. Juice the limes and measure out 1 cup of juice.

3. Mix egg yolks and milk. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together 6 large egg yolks and 2 cans (28 oz total) of sweetened condensed milk.
4. Add lime juice and zest. Add 1 cup fresh lime juice, 2 TBSP zest and 1/4 tsp salt to the bowl.
5. Whisk the filling. Stir until it’s thick and smooth.

6. Fill crust and bake. Pour the filling into the baked and cooled graham cracker crust, and bake at 350ºF for 20 minutes. The pie is done when the center barely jiggles when you move the pan.
7. Cool completely. Let the pie cool at room temperature, then refrigerate for at least 6 hours so it sets up completely.

Decorate The Pie

1. Make whipped cream. Combine 1 cup heavy whipping cream and 1/3 cup powdered sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment. Whip on medium-high speed until the cream is thick and holds medium-stiff peaks.
2. Pipe whipped cream. Transfer the mixture to a piping bag with a star tip and pipe rosettes around the outer edge of the pie.
3. Garnish. Finish with a sprinkling of lime zest and a twist of lime in the center.
4. Slice, serve, and devour!