Pink Lemonade Pie is a perfect end-of-summer dessert. It’s easy to make, requires very little cooking, it’s tangy, light, and refreshing, and it looks pretty—especially if you are a more artistic dessert decorator than I happen to be.

Most of the recipes for Pink Lemonade Pie use frozen pink lemonade concentrate and Cool Whip. To my taste, frozen lemonade concentrate bears little resemblance in flavor to fresh-squeezed lemonade. And, well, Cool Whip, is simply not on my list of culinary ingredients. Therefore, this recipe requires a bit more work—though not that much—but will give you the taste of true homemade dessert.

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For the Crust

Place the graham crackers and the sugar in a food processor and pulverize until fine. Add the butter and pulse until well blended.

Press into a deep 9-inch pie plate and bake at 350° for about 5-6 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let cool.

For the Filling

Open the cream cheese package and let it sit out until it becomes softened. Place a large bowl and beater in the freezer.

Place the raspberries and 1 tablespoon lemon juice in the bowl of a food processor or blender.

Process until smooth. Press the raspberry purée through a sieve to eliminate the seeds. Set the purée aside.

Zest the peel of 1 lemon with a vegetable peeler.

Place the zest in a saucepan with 1⁄2 cup of water and 1⁄2 cup sugar.

Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring. Simmer for 2 minutes, strain the syrup, then allow it to cool completely.

I learned from my spouse that really fine lemonade uses just a hint of orange juice, so I incorporated that bit of advice into this recipe.  It takes only a very small orange for this. Juice the orange.

Squeeze enough lemons(about 6-7) so that the juice, plus the orange juice, make 1 cup. 

In a large bowl, beat the softened cream cheese until smooth.

Add the can of condensed milk, and continue to beat until thoroughly homogenized.

(You may want to use only part of the condensed milk, depending on the tartness desired for the pie.) I use Borden’s Magnolia condensed milk.

Beat in the raspberry purée.

Then beat in  the strained sugar syrup and the cup of lemon-orange juice. If you haven’t used all of the condensed milk, taste the mixture now for sweetness and adjust accordingly. If you don’t get the pink color you desire, you can add a drop or two of red food coloring.

Chill the mixture until cold.

In the meantime, beat the cream in the cold bowl until stiff peaks are formed.

Remove the cold lemon mixture from the refrigerator, and stir in 1⁄4 of the whipped cream.

Then gently fold in the remaining cream.

The mixture will be very soft, almost liquid.

Pour the mixture into the graham cracker crust. If you don’t have a large enough free space in your freezer to place the pie so that it’s perfectly flat, first refrigerate it for 2-3 hours until it begins to set. If you place it in the freezer initially on a non-level space, it will spill over.

Freeze the pie for several hours or overnight. The pie cannot be stored in the refrigerator, or it will turn to nearly liquid.

The pie should be removed from the freezer 30-40 minutes before serving, depending on how warm your room is. The Pink Lemonade Pie is so hard directly out of the freezer you can barely slice it, even with a sharp knife. When served it should still have a frozen, but not rock-hard, texture.

You can serve the Pink Lemonade Pie as is or decorate it with sweetened whipped cream and/or half-moon lemon slices.

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