I made these lemon bars per a special request by my wonderful mother-in-law, Mary. She and her friend Tish came to visit us in Portland a few weeks ago and we had such a blast! We spent the week on a marathon tour of Portland and the surrounding area complete with a day of wine tasting, a trip to Multnomah Falls, and TONS of good food and drinks.
I’ve never attempted lemon bars and I couldn’t find a recipe in my grandma’s collection, so I did a little research and ended up using Ina Garten’s recipe from the Food Network. (NOTE: I did reduce the amount of sugar in the filling from 3 cups to 2 ¼ and they were plenty sweet!) The crust is delicious and the filling is akin to a really nice lemon curd - just as lemon bars should be. All in all, this sweet treat was the perfect addition to our wine tasting picnic!
Lemon Bars
Crust:
2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
Filling:
6 extra-large eggs, room temperature
2 1/4 cups sugar
2 tablespoons grated lemon zest
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 cup flour
Powdered sugar, for dusting
Technique:
- Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour 9x13 baking dish.
- For crust, cream butter and sugar (with paddle attachment if available). Combine flour and salt and gradually add to butter and sugar mixture with mixer on low speed.
- Dump dough onto well-floured board and work into a ball, then flatten to a disc.
- With well floured hands, press dough into prepared baking dish, until flat and level.
- Chill for 15 minutes then bake crust for 15 – 20 minutes until very lightly browned. Let cool on wire rack.
- Leave oven on at 350 and make filling as soon as crust comes out of the oven.
- For filling, whisk together eggs, sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice, and flour.
- Pour filling over crust and bake for 30 minutes, until filling is set.
- Let cool to room temperature, then chill for 2 hours before cutting.
- Cut into squares and dust with powdered sugar.
- I worked the dough for the crust a little bit before forming it into a ball and pressing into baking dish; this seemed to make it hold up a little better. Also, don’t forget to let it chill before baking it.
- Make sure to let the lemon bars chill for at least 2 hours before cutting into squares. This allows the filling to set all the way.
- Store in refrigerator and enjoy for up to 1 week.