Wednesday, June 15, 2016

When Life Gives You Lemons, Make a Lemon Tart


Hooray! It's our last month of residency! While we are overjoyed to be done with training, it also means that some of the wonderful friends we have made over the past three years will be moving away. It made me think of the saying "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade." Although being sad your friends are moving is hardly a lemon compared to the horrific recent events, I'll consider it a relative lemon. But why stop at lemonade? Our friends Jen and Curtis were celebrating their housewarming this weekend so we went ahead and turned our lemons into a lemon tart  to share. 



Lemon Tart Recipe

Total time: 2 hours (1 hour refrigerator time)
Serving size: One 8 inch round tart or one 13x4inch tart

Ingredients:
Pastry dough crust:
3/4  cup all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
5 tbsp unsalted butter, chilled
2-3 tbsp ice water

Custard:
6 egg yolks
1 whole egg
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup lemon juice
zest of 1 lemon
pinch of salt

Optional: Additional lemon slices, lemon zest and raspberries to garnish

Instructions:
  1. Mix flour and salt. Cut in butter with a knife and using a pastry blender, a fork, or even your fingers will do, blend butter into flour mixture until the pieces are about pea-sized. Work fast to avoid overheating the mixture. 
  2. Make a well in the middle of the mixture and add 4 tbsp water. Mix together until dough holds together when you press it. (does not need to be smooth) Add additional water up to 1 tbsp as needed
  3. Roll dough into a small log and on a floured surface, press dough away from you in a smearing motion. Roll dough back into a log and repeat once more. This step helps create the buttery flaky texture of the pastry. 
  4. Wrap dough in plastic wrap and store in refrigerator for 1 hour prior to use. 
  5. When ready to use, roll out dough into 1/4 inch thickness (or large enough to cover your tart pan. Press dough into tart pan and cut off excess dough. 
  6. Line dough with a piece of parchment paper and fill with dry rice or beans. This helps prevent the pie crust from rising and forming bubbles. 
  7. Bake at 375 degrees F for 20 minutes then remove rice and parchment paper. Your crust is now blind baked and ready to go!
  8. For the custard, whisk egg, egg yolk, sugar, lemon juice,  zest, and salt in a metal bowl over a pot of boiling water (like a double broiler). 
  9. Whisk constantly until mixture lightens up, thickens, and doubles in size. 
  10. Take off heat and transfer through a mesh strainer into a separate bowl. Discard zest. Place this bowl in an ice bath too cool to room temperature. 
  11. Fill blind baked pie crust with lemon curd and bake at 325 degrees F for 12 minutes until set. 
  12. Let cool to room temperature before serving. 
  13. Decorate with raspberries, lemon slices, lemon zest, and powdered sugar

We also checked out the Highland Springs Lavender Festival this weekend. Check back later for our lavender recipes!

2 comments:

  1. Yum! I love lemon desserts.

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  2. Wow, these seem to be truly yummilicious. I would love to try out some for my kids as they are kinda moody when it comes to food. Thanks for sharing this post

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