I was given a half dozen meyer lemons and was too busy to put them to use before another bag of vibrant and fragrant bag was offered once again the following week. I accepted the lemons which felt like a delightful challenge and made a batch of lemon bars. Well the internet is full of lemon bar recipes and a few had too many recipes and would yield an excess of egg whites so I kept searching. I got lucky and came across Ina Garten's recipe which seemed perfect.
I used the recipe, but opted to cut cold butter into small pieces and make that work ;) instead of patiently waiting for it to come to "room temperature" on a chilly San Francisco evening. This took a little more effort, but I still got a delicious shortbread crust. I forgot a trick I picked up somewhere to use the bottom of a glass to press the crust down, so be sure to do that to really press the crust down. I pressed the crust while it was still hot out of the oven after baking it before adding the filling.
*Use meyer lemons if you can.
* I recommend you do not dust the top with confectioners' sugar. I didn't dust them to keep the sugar a little lower and the keep the lemon shining. The crackled white top pictured below is from the filling alone and I'm going to stick with this naked top from here on out.
Total: 1 hr 35 min
Prep: 10 min
Inactive: 30 min
Cook: 55 min
Yield: 20 squares or 40 triangles
Level: Intermediate
Ingredients
For the crust:
1/2 pound unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 cups flour
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
For the filling:
6 extra-large eggs at room temperature
3 cups granulated sugar
2 tablespoons grated lemon zest (4-6 regular lemons, but I used 8 small meyer lemons)
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 cup flour
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
For the crust, cream the butter and sugar until light in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Combine the flour and salt and, with the mixer on low, add to the butter until just mixed. Dump the dough onto a well-floured board and gather into a ball. Flatten the dough with floured hands and press it into a 9 by 13 by 2-inch baking sheet, building up a 1/2-inch edge on all sides. Chill. (*I didn't chill the dough ahead of time and made due with cold butter as mentioned above)
Bake the crust for 15 to 20 minutes, until very lightly browned. Let cool on a wire rack. Leave the oven on. (*This is when I pressed the bottom of a glass down onto the crust to compress it a bit to make enough room for the filling).
For the filling, whisk together the eggs, sugar, lemon zest (super fine), lemon juice, and flour. Pour over the crust and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the filling is set. Cut into triangles.
Let cool to room temperature.... if you can. We snuck a tiny bite from the corner while still warm and had to leave the kitchen to ensure there were some left to share the next day.
I placed the tray in the refrigerator overnight covered with another tray.
I have a feeling these will be on heavy rotation for a while... especially while lemons and grey skies are in abundance until Spring fruit comes in.
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