Hi Everyone, so after all of the craziness of the last few months, we finally have something to look forward too. It’s summer time! And to me, one of my favorite things about summer is summer food. And to me a warm, comforting winter soup is great but nothing beats a bright, summery burger on the grill or hot dog and some pasta or potato salad. That is comfort food to me. Let me know down in the comments, what is your favorite food season?
I also love some summer desserts. One of my favorites is lemon squares. Whether you call them lemon squares or lemon bars, these are the perfect dessert for summer. And I am so excited to show you how to make them. Let’s get started.
Preparing the Pan
If you do not do anything else to prep for this recipe, you need to do this. It is so important so that the lemon squares will come out of the pan in one piece and so that you can cut these squares.
Preparing the pan is very simple. You just want to spray the pan with non stick spray and cut a piece of parchment paper to fit in the pan and be long enough to have parchment paper overlapping on the sides. Then spray the bottom and cut another piece the same way to go in the other direction.
Optional Steps: Straining and Cooling
Now, both of these steps are more for esthetic than anything so if you would like to skip them, that’s fine. First the straining. Sometimes when you mix up this batter you get bits of flour that didn’t incorporate, maybe a seed that made it in when you were squeezing the lemons. Things like that that can be strained out to make the batter smooth.
The second optional step is leaving the lemon squares in the oven with the oven door cracked and the oven off for an additional hour after baking to prevent cracking. Because lemon squares are a baked custard, similar to a cheesecake, the eggs in the batter make the batter rise in the oven and as it cools that batter falls and if it is not cooled gently using this method, it will crack. But you are going to sprinkle the squares with confectioners sugar anyway so if it doesn’t matter to you, just skip it.
I hope you enjoyed this recipe and I hope you try these. There will be many more summer recipes to come so I hope you come back with me next week. I’ll see you then.
Lemon Squares
Bright and zesty lemon bars with a sweet shourbread bottem.
Ingredients
Shortbread Crust
- 1 Cup of FlourÂ
- 1/2 of a Cup of Granulated Sugar
- 1 Stick of Unsalted Butter (Softened)
Lemon Square Batter
- 1/2 of a Cup of Lemon Juice
- Zest of one Lemon
- 3 Eggs
- 1 Cup of Granulated Sugar
- 1/4 of a Cup of All Purpose Flour
Instructions
Shortbread Crust
- Preheat the oven to 350• and prepare an 8x8 inch baking pan by spraying it with non stick spray and laying a piece of pachment paper down one way in the pan and then spray and lay another piece the other way..
- In a mediam sized bowl, mix together the flour,sugar and softened butter with your hands or with a rubber spatula until it form a sticky dough.
- Press it evenly into the bottem of your prepared pan and poke holes all around the crust with a fork.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes or until you get a light golden brown color.
Lemon Square
- Mix together the lemon juice,zest,eggs,sugar and flour until incorperated.
- (Optional) Run the batter through a sieve to catch anything that may not have incorperated.
- Pour the batter onto the prepared crust.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes.
- When it's at room temperture place it covered in the fridge for 3 hours to set.
- Take the lemon squares out of the pan and sprinkle them with sifted confectioners sugar and cup into desired number of squares. I did 9.
- Enjoy. Place leftovers on the fridge for up to a week.
    If you have any questions or comments please don’t hesitate to leave a comment down below, message me on instagram, facebook or leave me an email.Â