Key Lime Pie

The best key lime pie I had in Key West, with the Christmas lights above us reflecting in the tabletop.

One of the things I love the most about traveling is eating. With the virtual shrinking of our planet and the availability of just about every kind of food anywhere on the Earth, it's difficult to remember that many, if not all, foods are connected to cities, countries, regions and ultimately people that came before us. Sometimes enjoying foods in their places of origin, made and served by people in those places that first conceived of the dish, is incredibly special.

I've been fortunate in most every way in my life but I've been very lucky in the last year and a half to have eaten well in the places I've visited. And by eaten well, I don't mean that I managed to eat a lot, although let's face it, sometimes it has worked out that way. In the last 18 months since I started this blog, I've savored or wolfed down pretzels and sausages in Bavaria; apple strudel and schnitzel in Austria; meat soup in Iceland; tapas in Madrid; tagine in Morocco; paella in Barcelona; and fish and chips in England. Not all of this stuff has been what I expected but it all meant something to me. It connected me more to the place I was at the time.

Everything I listed in the previous paragraph occurred outside the United States but America has its fair share of regional specialties, maybe more than any of the countries I listed above just due to its sheer size. I've taken vacations before to explore food, most notably my trip a couple of years ago to Texas to find out if barbeque is any good at all (turns out it is). My trip last month to Florida offered me the opportunity to renew my American food experience and sample one of my favorite desserts in the place where it was invented: key lime pie in Key West, Florida.

Key lime pie is a dessert made from condensed milk, egg yolks, lime juice and, of course, a pie crust, which is typically made from graham crackers. The pie is a no bake dessert; the chemical reaction between the acidic lime juice and the sweetened condensed milk causes the pie filling to thicken naturally. Its origin can be traced back to the early 20th century in the Florida Keys, although I am not convinced by any of the stories I have read to believe in a single originator of the recipe. The pie filling is traditionally made with key limes, which are native to the Florida Keys (perhaps obviously) and are tarter than the more common Persian limes.

Of all the fruit groups in the world, the citrus fruits are my favorite so my key lime pie quest was something I looked forward to with great anticipation. My bar was set high here and I was hoping Key West would not disappoint. Here's what I found.

Kermit's Key West Key Lime Shop

First stop on my key lime pie tour: Kermit's Key West Key Lime Shop. There are two Kermit's stores located in Key West. We elected to stop in to the one at the corner of Greene and Elizabeth Streets near the harbor. If there's anything you want that can possibly be key lime flavored, you can get it at Kermit's. Key lime fudge. Key lime curd. Key lime barbeque sauce. Key lime salsa. Key lime peanuts. Key lime candy. Well, I'm sure you get the point by now. If something key lime flavored can be jarred, bottled or packaged, Kermit's has it.

A store with the array of key lime products that Kermit's offers is a can't miss Key West stop in my book. Now imagine it gets better. Imagine you can sample pretty much every key lime product they make. Stop in Kermit's sometime and your dreams will come true. I swear you don't need to pay for dessert in Key West. Head over to Kermit's and eat one of everything in the store and then buy something to go and you are likely to save money and have something to take back to your hotel or as a souvenir when you head back home. I love this place. I can't tell you how many times I've been tempted to mail order some key lime peanuts in the last month and a half.

Now when it came time to grab a piece of key lime pie at Kermit's, I opted for the chocolate dipped key lie pie on a stick. While it may seem odd for me to elect to go with a non-traditional pie on the very first stop, the little research I did ahead of time about pie in the Keys led me to believe this was the only place I would get it on a stick. Throwing caution to the wind and knowing I would likely get a couple of additional shots at key lime pie on the trip, I ordered a piece and headed outside into Kermit's courtyard, which is an awesome place to eat a piece of pie at any time of the day, dipped or non-dipped.

I may have made the wrong call. Of all the products I ate at Kermit's, the chocolate dipped pie was likely one of the least tasty. That's not to say it wasn't good. But what I really wanted was great. I mean I'm in the Keys for crying out loud. Overall I found the pie a little dull and a little bitter; I'm assuming it lost some of it's citrus-y flavor when it was dipped and chilled. I've found in my own cooking that dishes with fresh lime or lemon are best immediately after cooking. Waiting just doesn't do it justice. I had some great stuff at Kermit's. The pie on a stick just wasn't one of them.

Key West Key Lime Pie Company

Bobby Flay used to have a show on the Food Network called Throwdown. The premise of the show was that he would travel around the country in search of folks who cook a classic American dish in its most authentic, traditional or absolute best incarnation and then challenge them to see if he could best their version in a one-on-one cooking competition. He most always lost because of course he's no expert at cooking the selected dish and they presumably are. When it came time for him to throw down with a key lime pie expert, he (or whoever picks these places for him) chose the Key West Key Lime Pie Company. I figured that was as much of a tacit endorsement from the Food Network as I would get and so chose this place for my second key lime pie experience of my trip.

The Key West Key Lime Pie Company is located on the corner of Greene and Ann Streets in downtown Key West. Since it was about a block from the location where the Doubletree shuttle bus dropped us off each time we headed into town, we had walked by the place four or five times before we decided to stop in for an afternoon snack after visiting the Dry Tortugas and before taking a couple of hours nap back at the hotel. I guess it was technically dessert after our meal of almost the best ever fish tacos at the Hog's Breath Saloon about a block west and north of there.

The restaurant itself features a large seating area with the kitchen and prep area to the left as you walk in and the serving counter to the rear of the shop. Pretty much each time we had walked by the store prior to stopping in to sample the wares, the scene in the place looked pretty similar to the picture above, although sometimes instead of having one dude in a lime green t-shirt checking his phone at an empty table there was absolutely nobody eating pies in the restaurant. Danger sign? Maybe. We bought a slice to go, not being able to stand the atmosphere and wanting to get back to the bus stop to get back to the hotel. That nap I referenced above was calling, after all.

I realize standing at a bus stop eating a piece of key lime pie while waiting for a bus probably didn't enhance my impression of this pie but I'd say it was disappointing all around. I'd offer three basic criticisms here. First, the pie was not acidic enough. There was an option in the store to get the extra tart version which I declined. This may have been a mistake. Second, the whipped cream adorning the pie was sweetened and tasted more like whipped topping than actual real dairy cream. Finally and most importantly, the texture was off. The pie filling was way too stiff. It felt artificial. I'm fairly sure (without checking at all) that there was some gelatin added to this pie.

If there's anything nice to say about the Key West Key Lime Company's pie, it's that the crust was sweet and tasty. It would probably have been a nice complement to the tartness of the pie, except that it wasn't tart. There are a ton of places to buy key lime pie in Key West. I'd pass on this one in the future.

Pepe's

There's perhaps (remember I said perhaps) only so much key lime pie you can eat in a day and a half in Key West but after the first two experiences fell a little to a lot flat, I had to keep going. On the advice of a friend and some websites I'd found before setting off for Key West, we decided to eat our last dinner of the trip at Pepe's. I'd already checked their website ahead of time and knew they had key lime pie on the menu, so I also knew this was my last chance to get some pie in the town that made it famous.

Pepe's honestly looks like a roadside shack (their website says "joint"). It's a wood framed building on Caroline Street where folks have been eating food since 1909, making it the oldest restaurant in Key West today. The main restaurant (the right half of the building in the picture above) features a few inside tables and booths. The adjoining semi-covered patio (the left side of the building behind the fence in the picture above) has the majority of the seating area and the bar. It's just the kind of place I look for when I travel: local, a bit out of the way and serving fantastic food.

Pepe's was so good for dinner that we went back for breakfast the next day before getting out of town. But the first night after a delicious meal of mahi mahi and grouper entrees, we saved just enough room (or maybe not - might just have been piggy here) for a slice of key lime pie, the last of the trip. The untouched portion is the photograph at the top of this post.

Pepe's saved my key lime pie experience in Key West. The pie was tarter than both Kermit's and the Key West Key Lime Pie Company's pies, which above all was what I was looking for. But there was more than that. The crust was tasty, probably less sweet than the Key Lime Pie Company's version but striking a nice balance between sugar in the crust and the tart in the filling. The cream was also real fresh whipped cream, which cooled off the acid from the lime. And it felt more homemade than the other two places and ultimately that mattered. Above all in this regard, the crust was obviously hand formed because there was a little more at the meeting between the bottom and sides of the crust. The fresh lime wedge on top for an extra squeeze of juice was a nice touch too.

I don't imagine I will ever get back to Key West. I'm not a guy who goes back to the same place year after year (Las Vegas and New York are exceptions). I could be wrong here. And if I am mistaken and I get back there one day, I'm up for some more key lime pie. I'll definitely stop by Pepe's, maybe more than once, for both a meal and some pie for dessert. I'll hit up Kermit's too for some key lime food, especially the peanuts and the curd, but I'm liable to look elsewhere for the pie. There are a ton more places in the Keys to get it. I'll read this post right before I head down again if there's a next time.

Pepe's: the "after" picture.