Lemon Squares with Olive Oil

Ricardo
Ricardo @tallcook
Manhattan, New York, United States

Good quality ingredients always pay off, especially in this recipe. These excellent lemon squares were a creation of Melissa Clark of The New York Times.

#sweet #dessert #treat #pastry #cookies #bars #bites

Lemon Squares with Olive Oil

Good quality ingredients always pay off, especially in this recipe. These excellent lemon squares were a creation of Melissa Clark of The New York Times.

#sweet #dessert #treat #pastry #cookies #bars #bites

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Ingredients

1 hour 30 minutes, plus cooling and chilling
36 bite-size squares
  1. For the Crust
  2. 155 gramsall-purpose flour
  3. 50 gramssugar
  4. 25 gramsconfectioners’ sugar
  5. 1 teaspoongrated lemon zest
  6. 1/4 teaspoonkosher salt
  7. 142 gramscold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
  8. For the Curd
  9. 3/4 cuplemon juice (3 to 6 lemons)
  10. 250 gramssugar
  11. 2large eggs plus 3 yolks
  12. 5 gramscornstarch
  13. Pinchkosher salt
  14. 57 gramsunsalted butter
  15. 1/4 cup (60 ml)olive oil, ideally a fruity, peppery one
  16. 2 teaspoonsgrated lemon zest
  17. Confectioners’ sugar and sea salt flakes, for sprinkling

Cooking Instructions

1 hour 30 minutes, plus cooling and chilling
  1. 1

    Heat oven to 325 degrees and line a 9-by-9-inch baking pan with enough parchment to hang over two of the sides (to be used as handles later to lift the bars out of the pan).

  2. 2

    To make the shortbread base, pulse together the flour, granulated sugar, confectioners’ sugar, lemon zest and salt in a food processor. Add butter and pulse to cut the butter into the flour until a crumbly dough forms.

  3. 3

    Press dough into prepared pan and bake until shortbread is pale golden all over, 30 minutes.

  4. 4

    While the shortbread is baking, prepare the lemon curd: Grate 2 teaspoons zest from lemons and set aside. Squeeze lemons to yield ¾ cup juice.

  5. 5

    In a small saucepan, whisk together lemon juice, sugar, eggs and yolks, cornstarch and fine sea salt over medium heat until boiling and thickened, 2 to 5 minutes. Make sure mixture comes to a boil and stays there for 30 seconds or so; you should see it thicken up before you take it off the heat. But once it boils do not cook for longer than 1 minute or you risk the curd thinning out again.

  6. 6

    Remove from heat and strain into a bowl. Whisk in butter, olive oil and lemon zest.

  7. 7

    When the shortbread is ready, take it out of the oven and carefully pour the lemon curd onto the shortbread base; return the pan to the oven. Bake until topping is just set, 10 to 15 minutes more.

  8. 8

    Allow to cool to room temperature, then refrigerate until cold before cutting into bars. Sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar and flaky sea salt right before serving.

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Ricardo
Ricardo @tallcook
on
Manhattan, New York, United States
My mother was a very good home cook, which made me appreciate homemade food to this day.
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Comments

Notacook
Notacook @Reallycantcook
I will say I had the pleasure of receiving some of this batch as a gift, and boy were they delicious. A crumbly cookie base and a sinfully tart curd top, what could go wrong? And dressing them with the topping just before serving made me feel like a chef! There were good for several days in a sealed container, and I dare anyone to try and have them in the house for more than a couple of days… It won’t happen but you will love trying! Enjoy

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