Today, we are sharing a very nice recipe for the summer with you. Those sweet and refreshing lemon bars are perfect for a hot day spent in the garden. They are prepared easily and you keep them in the fridge so they really cool you off.
Just give this recipe a try and be prepared for the hot summer days that are hopefully ahead!
Things to know before you start
Time Schedule
| Steps | Work time | Waiting time |
| Mix – Crust | ~10 minutes | – |
| Coat baking pan | ~10 minutes | – |
| Bake #1 | – | 25 minutes |
| Cool #1 | – | 15 minutes |
| Mix – Filling | ~15 minutes | – |
| Bake #2 | – | 25 minutes |
| Cool #2 | – | 3-4 hours |
| Serve | ~5 minutes | – |
The lemon bars will be ready to eat in about 5 hours depending on how long you can wait with the cooling process 😉
Total ingredients
| Weight | Ingredient |
| 285 g | All-purpose flour |
| 400 g | White sugar |
| 3 g | Salt |
| 225 g | Butter |
| 4x | Eggs |
| 120 g | Lemon juice from 2 to 3 untreated lemons |
| 8 g | Vanilla extract |
| 50 g | Powdered sugar |
You will have about 1.250 g of lemon bars in total. As lemons can vary greatly in size you will need about 2 to 3 lemons to get 120 g of lemon juice out of them.
Difficulty
A simple recipe with little effort as the actual working time is only about 40 minutes. It is similar to baking a cheesecake.
Baking tools
A hand mixer, two bowls and a square or rectangular baking pan are needed.
A 24 x 24 cm square baking pan is ideal, but other sizes are also fine. Just keep in mind that the bigger the baking pan, the flatter your lemon bars will be.
Steps
1. Mix – Crust
| Weight | Ingredient |
| 225 g | Butter – Softened |
| 100 g | White sugar |
| 8 g | Vanilla extract |
| 3 g | Salt |
| 250 g | All-purpose flour |
- Mix all of the mentioned ingredients together with a hand mixer by starting with the softened butter, white sugar, vanilla extract and salt until combined
- Add the all-purpose flour step by step while mixing further until completely combined
- Tip: If you take your butter directly out of the fridge, you can cut the butter in smaller chunks into a bowl and melt in the microwave for about 30 seconds to soften it
2. Coat Baking Pan
- Lay out your square or rectangular baking pan with parchment paper
- Press the previously created dough firmly into the baking pan and make sure that everything is even
3. Bake #1
- Preheat oven to 170°C (338°F) with the upper and lower heat function
- Put the baking pan in and bake for 25 minutes until golden brown
4. Cool #1
- Take the baking pan out and let the crust cool for 15 minutes
5. Mix – Filling
| Weight | Ingredient |
| 300 g | White sugar |
| 35 g | All-purpose flour |
| 4x | Eggs |
| 120 g | Lemon juice from 2 to 3 untreated lemons |
- Sift sugar and all-purpose flour together in a bowl so there are no flour lumps
- Rinse the lemons under hot water, dry them off, squeeze out the juice and add to the bowl
- Add eggs and gently mix together until fully combined
- Pour the filling over the previously baked crust
- Tip: If you like, you can also add some lemon zest to the mix for a more intense taste
6. Bake #2
- Preheat oven to 165°C (329°F) for ~20 minutes with the upper and lower heat function
- Put the soon to be lemon bars in the oven and bake for 25 minutes
7. Cool #2
- Remove the baking pan from the oven and let it cool on the counter for 2 hours
- Afterwards put it in the fridge and let it cool further for 1 to 2 hours
8. Serve
- Take the baking pan out of the fridge
- Cut into squares to get the iconic lemon bars look
- Sprinkle with powdered sugar until fully covered
Conclusion
Taste
These lovely lemon bars taste a little like a lemon cake of course, due to the high amount of lemon juice in it.
The combination of sweet and sour is very balanced and refreshing. The soft but firm texture of the lemon topping is a good contrast to the baked base of the bars.
As you keep them cool it really makes them a perfect summer dessert. You cut them in pieces so you can take a bit now and then and don’t feel like you have to eat a big piece of cake.
The powdered sugar covers a bit of the sourness of the lemon topping and takes care the bars are not too sour.
They go really good with some fresh lemonade made out of lime and mint.
Lessons Learned
This was the first time ever we made lemon bars and unfortunately they didn’t came out as good as we wished them to be.
They have been too flat as we used a baking pan that was too big with it’s 23 x 33 cm. Also most of the crust was moved to the sides by the lemon filling. This happened because we baked the crust for only 20 minutes and didn’t let it cool off for 15 minutes afterwards.
The recipe is already adjusted so you will have a better result than we had but you can be sure that they still tasted great. We are going to bake this recipe for lemon bars again in the near future and share the result with you.
Gallery
