Quick and Easy Lemon Bars
Perfectly sweet and tart lemon bars on the best shortbread crust ever. These quick and easy lemon bars are great for any spring or summer treat.
Story Behind the Lemon Bars
As I sit and write this recipe for lemon bars, I’m reminded that it is the first official day of spring. After living in Utah for almost 5 years now, I’ve learned to not be tricked by the fickle Utah weather. This is usually how the seasons go here.
We typically have a very short month of spring, followed by a hot summer with the most amazing cool summer nights. Then you get two weeks of beautiful fall weather, followed by 6 months of winter. We will then enter into a few weeks of fool’s spring where you start getting excited and pack away all of the winter snow clothes. Just when you think you are off to warmer weather, then BOOM, it’s winter again.
That’s exactly where we are right now; second winter. In fact, my husband and I are in shock at how big the snowflakes are that are currently falling from the sky. They literally look like golf balls. Snowflakes as big as golf balls is a saying, right?!
Anyways, back during fool’s spring, I decided I needed to start bringing out all of those fresh berries and lemon flavors. I decided on a lemon bar because those are so delicious. I found lemon bar recipe in my grandmother’s recipes I was given for Christmas.
She was actually given the recipe by a friend, Audrey Pascual, who lived in the same apartment complex when they lived in Baumholder, Germany. Supposedly she was an excellent cook, especially with Guatemalan food, which was her native country.
More On Lemon Bars
I don’t know how many Guatemalan German transplants are known for their lemon bars, but these are delicious! That buttery shortbread crust in the most amazing base. It’s got the perfect texture to balance out the lemon custard on topped. I put these in front of my kids with a lemon macaron I was given from a local bakery, and they chose these bars over the macaron. That says A LOT because my kids loved macarons. Right when you bite into that crust, it’s the most satisfying crunch, chew, and taste.
These bars come together fairly quickly, but they do need to cool completely before cutting into them. No one wants a runny lemon bar! As I made these, I kept thinking how good these would be to make into an orange bar or a coconut lime bar. So stay tuned because my creative wheels are turning.
Additional Recipes Similar to these Lemon Bars
- Lemon Ice Box Cake
- Easy Lemon Meringue Croissants
- Lemon Pound Cake
- Orange Bars (with honey whipped cream)
Lemon Bars
Ingredients
For the Crust
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- ⅓ cup powdered sugar
- ½ cup butter softened, almost melted
For the Lemon Custard
- 3 eggs beaten
- 3 TBS lemon juice freshly squeezed
- 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
- ¾ tsp baking powder
- 3 TBS flour
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Line an 8×8 square pan with parchment and set aside.
- In a small mixing bowl, combine flour, powdered sugar, and butter together with a hand mixer. Mixture will look slightly crumbly, but should come together as pressed into the pan.
- Press the dough into the pan evenly, and bake for 10 minutes. It will continue to bake more once the lemon mixture is on.
- While the crust is baking, combine eggs, sugar, and flour together in a mixing bowl with a whisk. It should turn a pale yellow. Add in lemon juice and baking powder and mix until combined.
- Pour mixture on top of crust once it comes out of the oven and place back in the oven for 25 minutes.
- Completely cool the bars in the refrigerator and generously sprinkle with powdered sugar right before serving.
Just the right amount of sweet and sour! And quite easy to make.