Lemon Bar
Sweet and tangy lemon bars with a creamy filling and a crisp and buttery shortbread crust, are the perfect dessert to make in spring. They are delicious and so easy to make and I just love that bright yellow color of them!
Ingredients
For the crust:
- ½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature - 113 grams
- 3 tbsp powdered sugar - 20 grams
- ½ tsp lemon zest
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup + 2 tbsp all purpose flour, sifted - 145 grams
- ⅛ tsp salt
For the filling:
- 3/4 cup + 1 tbsp granulated sugar - 162 grams
- 3 tbsp all purpose flour - 22 grams
- ⅛ tsp salt
- 1 tbsp lemon zest
- ¼ cup fresh lemon juice
- 2 eggs - room temperature
- 1 egg yolk - room temperature
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
Crust
- Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease and line a 8x8 glass or ceramic pan with parchment paper, leaving some overhang on the sides.
- In a large bowl, add in the room temperature butter, powdered sugar, salt, lemon zest and vanilla extract. Beat for about 2 minutes until it's light and fluffy.
- Add in the sifted flour and mix just until the dough comes together.
- Transfer the dough to your baking pan and press it with your hand to an even layer. If the dough sticks to your hand, flour your hand very slightly. You can bring the dough up to the edges just a bit to get some crispy yummy edges!
- Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes or until the edges begin getting golden brown. While you are waiting you can measure your filling ingredients but don't mix them together until ready to pour in the crust. Because if lemon juice and eggs sit together for a while they'll react and it may become curdled and weird!
- Take out the crust and let it sit while we make the filling. (You don't want the crust to cool down completely, the filling should be added to a warm crust.)
Filling
- In a bowl add in sugar, lemon zest, salt and flour. Whisk them together very well.
- Juice the lemon to get 1/4 cup of juice and add it to the flour mixture.
- Add in the eggs and vanilla extract and whisk all of them together really well. Don't skip the vanilla extract because it gets rid of the egg smell.
- Pour the filling over warm crust and bake for about 20 minutes or until the filling is just set. It means the top is white and when you gently shake the pan, you'll see a very slight jiggle in the center. The center will continue cooking as the filling is cooling down.
- Let the pan cool down on a wire rack completely, about an hour, and then refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight.
- Grab the overhang parchment paper and slowly lift the lemon bar out of the pan. It sometimes get a little sticky on the sides but don't panic it will come out.
- Use a large knife and cut it to squares, wiping off your knife after each cut.
- Sprinkle with powdered sugar and more lemon zest if you like.
Video
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