Key Lime Pie
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Bright, tangy, and ultra-creamy, this key lime pie has just the right balance of sweet and tart—perfect for warm days and easy entertaining.
I’ve been making this Key lime pie for years, and it’s one of my favorite desserts to serve when the weather warms up. Inspired by the classic pie made famous in the Florida Keys, it has a buttery graham cracker crust and a cool, creamy filling that’s the perfect balance of sweet and tart. Best of all, it’s easy to make with just a handful of ingredients—you can use regular limes from the grocery store, and Greek yogurt stands in for the usual egg yolks (trust me, it works). I’ve served this pie everywhere from summer barbecues to holiday dinners, and it’s always a crowd-pleaser.
“The best key lime pie I’ve ever had!! Tart, sweet, fresh but rich.”
Do You Really Need Key Limes?
Despite the name, you don’t need Key limes to make an outstanding Key lime pie. Over the years, I’ve made this pie with bottled Key lime juice (such as Nellie & Joe’s), fresh Key limes, and regular limes (also called Persian limes), and I actually prefer regular limes. They’re easy to find year-round and have a bright, fresh flavor that makes an exceptional pie. If you have access to fresh Key limes, though, they’re delicious too, lending the pie a slightly more floral, aromatic flavor.
What You’ll Need To Make Key Lime Pie
For the crust, you’ll need finely crushed graham cracker crumbs, light brown sugar, and melted butter. For the filling, you’ll need sweetened condensed milk, Greek yogurt, fresh lime juice and lime zest. For the topping, you’ll need heavy cream and confectioners’ sugar.
You’ll notice this recipe doesn’t call for egg yolks, like many traditional Key lime pie recipes. After testing it both ways, I found they simply weren’t necessary. The pie sets beautifully because the lime juice’s acidity reacts with the proteins in the yogurt and sweetened condensed milk, thickening the filling as it bakes (the same basic reaction that turns milk into cheese). And from a taste standpoint, I actually prefer the cleaner, brighter lime flavor that comes from leaving the yolks out. As a bonus, there’s no separating eggs, making the recipe even easier to prepare.
“Outstanding! Sets up beautifully and has the most perfect lime flavor.”
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Mix the crust. Combine the graham cracker crumbs, brown sugar, and melted butter, stirring first with a fork, then finishing with your hands until the mixture looks like damp sand and holds together when you squeeze a bit in your palm.
Step 2: Press the crust into the pan. Work the crumbs up the sides of the pan first, then press the bottom—it’s easier this way. Press firmly; a loosely packed crust tends to crumble when you slice the pie later.
Step 3: Blind bake. Bake just until the edges turn a shade darker and it smells toasty. This short bake deepens the flavor of the crust and keeps the crust from turning soggy once the filling goes in, but it doesn’t need to brown deeply.
Step 4: Zest, then juice. Zest every lime you plan to juice before you cut into them—it’s nearly impossible to zest a lime once it’s been squeezed. A rasp grater makes this fast; a reamer or your hands work fine for juicing.
Step 5: Whisk the filling. Whisk the condensed milk, yogurt, zest, and juice together until completely smooth. The mixture will look thick, almost like a pudding.
Step 6: Bake and chill. Pour the filling into the warm crust and bake until the center looks just set. Let it cool for a bit on the counter, then pop it in the fridge for at least 3 hours to set completely. It’ll firm up further as it cools and chills.
Step 7: Whip the cream. Beat the heavy cream until it just starts to hold soft peaks, then add the confectioners’ sugar and continue beating until it’s thick enough to hold its shape when you lift the whisk. Don’t take it too far past this point—overwhipped cream turns grainy and starts to look more like butter than a topping.
Pro Tip: A hand whisk works fine here too if you don’t feel like pulling out the mixer—it just takes a bit more elbow grease.
Step 8: Top and serve. Top with the whipped cream shortly before serving rather than hours ahead, since cream loses its shape sitting on a cold pie for too long. A knife wiped clean between cuts will give you the neatest slices.
Key Lime Pie Video Tutorial
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Key Lime Pie
Ingredients
For the Crust
- 1½ cups finely crushed graham cracker crumbs, from about 12 whole graham crackers
- ⅓ cup (packed) light brown sugar
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
For the Filling
- Two 14-oz cans sweetened condensed milk
- 1 cup plain Greek yogurt (2% or whole milk)
- 1 tablespoon grated lime zest
- ¾ cup fresh lime juice
For the Topping
- 1 cup cold heavy cream
- 2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
- 1 teaspoon grated lime zest
- 8 to 10 thin lime slices
Instructions
- Make the Crust: Preheat oven to 375°F (190°C) and set an oven rack in the middle position.
- In a medium bowl, combine the graham cracker crumbs, brown sugar, and melted butter; stir with a fork first, and then your hands until the mixture is well combined. Using your fingers and the bottom of a glass or dry measuring cup, press the crumbs firmly into the bottom and up the sides of a 9 x 1½-in (23 x 4-cm) pie pan. The crust should be about ¼-in (6-mm) thick. (Tip: do the sides first.)
- Bake for 10 minutes, until just slightly browned. Let the crust cool on a wire rack.
- Make the Filling: Lower the oven temperature to 350°F (180°C). In a large bowl, whisk together the sweetened condensed milk, yogurt, lime zest, and lime juice. Pour the thick mixture into the warm graham cracker crust. Bake for 15 minutes, until the filling is almost set; it should wobble a bit. Let cool at room temperature for 30 minutes, then place in the refrigerator to chill thoroughly, about 3 hours.
- Make the Topping: In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the heavy cream until soft peaks form. Add the confectioners’ sugar and beat until medium peaks form. Top the pie with the whipped cream. Decorate with the lime zest and lime slices. Store the pie in the refrigerator until ready to serve. Slice the pie into wedges, wiping your knife clean between slices, and serve cold.
Notes
- Make-Ahead Instructions: You can make the crust a day ahead of time, but the filling should be added on the day of serving, otherwise the crust will get soggy.
- The nutritional information was calculated using 2% Greek yogurt.
Nutrition Information
This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
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I made this pie for a pie competition and I won!! It was so delicious and everybody loved it!
made this for some people and they LOVED it, even after a couple days. it’s been requested i make it again
i had someone ask if i could make it with raspberry.. how do you think that could work? i’d like to use fresh raspberries, so I could make a sauce or something to go in..
Hi Alex, so glad it was a hit! I don’t recommend adding a raspberry sauce to the filling but you could top the pie with this berry sauce (and stick with just raspberries), or serve it on the side.
dang I’m making this for tomorrow, I didnt see the note about the pie getting soggy until I already made the filling and crust because its at the very end of the recipe. I haven’t put them together yet, can I keep the filling and crust in fridge and combine them later?
Definitely – hope you enjoy!
Hi Jenn! My friend gave me a bag of limes so I decided to try making this keylime recipe. Everything went great from the oven to the set of the filling ! Only thing was my mother and I tried it, we thought it was to sweet for us! I followed the recipe and added no extra sugar or anything (except for the little brown sugar in the crust which I still cut in half). I’m wondering if you can let me know of a way to make it less sweet if that’s possible ?? 🤣 it’s so good and the whip helps it out for sure but my family I guess isn’t as big of a sweet tooth! Thankyou for allowing me to try out your recipe ❤️
Hi Brittany, Glad you enjoyed it overall. If you want to cut the sweetness, you could use a tad more lime juice, omit the sugar from the whipped cream topping, and stick with reducing the sugar in the crust. Hope that helps!
This is my absolute favorite and go to recipe! But I have a question. Why does my crust get soggy by the next day? Thanks for your input!
So glad you like it! This has a very wet filling, so it’s normal for the crust to get soggy by day two. Unfortunately there’s not a lot you can do about it.
Sooo delicious!!
I made 3 for a party and some people were unable to attend so I find myself with an extra pie sans the whipped cream topping. Could I wrap it in foil and freeze it?
Hi Jo, Glad you enjoyed it! I’ve never frozen it and wouldn’t necessarily think it would freeze well, but a few readers have commented they’ve frozen leftover pie successfully, so I think it’s worth a try. And it’s certainly a better alternative to it going to waste!
My pie turned out just okay. I had to supplement half of the graham crackers with soup/oyster crackers (since my son got into them), replaced the condensed milk with almond milk, and used vegan yogurt instead of heavy cream because I forgot it at the store. I also added a pinch of sugar to the almond milk and only put the topping on half of the pie for Mark. My husband Mark is diabetic, while my son is autistic and picky so I tried to make this healthy but normal. Sadly the topping never formed peaks so it went everywhere. The filling was really runny too and seeped into the crust. My son loved it and I did eat seconds so it did the job. Mark could only eat a silver and had to skip dinner. I will never make this again sadly.
How strange that substituting runny almond milk instead of thick sweetened condensed milk would leave your filling a runny mess. Plus oyster crackers and vegan yogurt… Bless your heart, this is the best thing I’ve read all day. 😀
I’m so glad you said it first. I honestly thought it was a parody as no one could possibly make that many odd changes and then comment that they’re unhappy with the results. I don’t know how Jenn holds back sometimes…
This was AMAZING.
Will absolutely make this again
This is the best recipe!! I have made it lots of times and have gotten compliments from Key Lime Pie connoisseurs saying this is the best one they have had! It is my husbands favorite and I make it every year for his birthday. It is also an extremely easy recipe to follow
Can’t we print this recipe or do we have to have an account here to do that?
Hi Debbie, yes, you can print any recipe from the blog – no account necessary. Please LMK if I can help in any other way.
This was AMAZING.
Will absolutely make this again
How would I go about making this into separate tiny pies in a muffin tin? Would it work?
Hi Eva, I haven’t done it, so I’m not 100% sure. One other reader said the following about using a muffin tin: I used muffin liners in pan, and cut the baking time in half. Hope you find that helpful!