I’m taking over Soggy Bottoms this month, because I want to talk about lemons!
A freak storm damaged some of the branches on my lemon tree, and I ended up harvesting several bags of lemony goodness.
I’ve been desperately seeking lemon recipes ever since.
Luckily, I collect vintage cookbooks, so I opened up Victorian Parlors and Tea Parties by Patricia Mitchell, a 36-page booklet with recipes culled in part from the Pittsylvania County Public Library in Virginia. This was published in 1991 and it’s probably been sitting on my bookshelf almost as long.
If historical accuracy is important to you, note that some recipes have been adapted to include “derivations [that] are more healthful because whole wheat flour is used and very little fat,” and others are attributed to mid-20th century cookbooks.
Still, I have too many lemons to be choosy so I decided to make “Good Breeding” Lemon Squares. Like most older recipes, this one is bracingly simple compared to the chatty, encouraging tone of my favorite modern cookbooks. This recipe called for 2 sticks of margarine. I was skeptical. Was margarine around in the late 19th century?
I called my food scientist friend, Amy, who claimed the only thing she remembered about the history of margarine was that it was illegal to sell it in Wisconsin until 1967. This is true.
Also, margarine used to be white, and you had to knead in the yellow food coloring separately. This is also true.
I had no idea that margarine was so controversial.
But as much as I love courting controversy, I love butter even more, so that’s what goes into this recipe.
As I squeezed two lemons, I was surprised this recipe calls for only ⅓ of a cup of lemon juice. I was hoping this would use up a least a dozen of these babies. I contemplated following the recipe and not adding salt but just couldn’t do it.
After a couple of pinches, the dough is pressed into my largest lasagna pan, a free souvenir from opening a bank account in my Italian-American neighborhood. I decided to put parchment down first because my mama raised me right.
There were no instructions on how to tell when these are done, so I guess you just step into the terrifying breach.
After precisely 20 minutes, the resulting bars had a crisp buttery crust that melted in my mouth, and a slightly chewy topping that was intensely sweet and barely tasted like lemons.
The bar base is pretty spectacular, and these were a hit with my friends, but I preferred the tart filling of Joanne Chang’s Lemon Lust Bars. That recipe calls for 14 lemons, which is just what I need to use up a few more of my citrus babies.
Next time I make lemon bars, I’m going to combine the bottom of this recipe, with the topping of Chang’s.
“Good Breeding” Lemon Squares
Crust:
2 c. flour
2 sticks margarine
½ c. confectioners’ sugar
[I added ¼ tsp salt]
Melt margarine and then blend with flour and sugar. Pat into 9X13-inch pan. Bake 20 minutes on 350 F.
Topping:
4 eggs
¼ – ⅓ c. lemon juice
4 Tbsp flour
2 c. sugar
½ tsp. Salt
1 tsp baking powder
Beat eggs and lemon juice. Sift other ingredients together. Add to eggs and lemon juice. Pour on top of crust while hot. Bake 25 minutes more at 350 F. When cool, sprinkle with confectioners’ sugar and cut into squares.
“Good breeding” is such a silly concept, with its implication that pedigree will equal upper class manners. My favorite trope about good breeding is the inconvenient heir, usually a middle-class man whose wealthier relatives wish he would go far far away, and leave them to burn money in peace. Matthew Crawley from Downton Abbey is one of my favorite versions of this character, especially when he responds to his relatives’ aristocratic rituals with bemusement and exasperation.
In fact, I just finished knitting a lovely art deco sock pattern inspired by Matthew, Jimenez Joseph’s Crawley Socks. No one asked me for a knitting pairing with this recipe, but there you go.
My book suggestion to go along with these lemon bars is An Unseen Attraction by KJ Charles. Clem Talleyfer runs a cozy boarding house in Victorian London. He’s carved out a predictable life away from his wealthy and disapproving relatives, when a murder mystery and a sexy taxidermist show up to disrupt his carefully ordered life.
Like these bars, Clem is addictively sweet. He and his gentleman caller have flirtatious conversations over tea in his private parlor. The only thing cozier would be if the two started knitting socks together.
Have you read any inconvenient heirs lately?
And more importantly, what lemon recipes should I try next?
I love lemon bars but do not live in a place where owning an outdoor lemon tree is possible. So my lemon juice SOMETIMES comes from a grocery store lemon but USUALLY from a bright yellow bottle. The book sounds great though!
These lemon recipes are fantastic!
Microwave lemon curd (sooo much easier than “real” lemon curd”
https://greedyeats.com/microwave-lemon-curd/
If you micrawave it more than needed, it turns taffy-ish in consistency which is AWESOME
also a diff microwave lemon curd that is not so overtly sugary:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/recipes/meyer-lemon-and-olive-oil-curd/16877/?tid=ss_pin
Baked Candied Lemon Slices
https://healthfully.com/546896-how-to-bake-candied-lemon-slices-in-an-oven.html
Preserved Lemon–Almond Sauce
https://www.cooksillustrated.com/recipes/13146-preserved-lemon-almond-sauce
and finally
Juiced Lemon Purée from the empty (already squeezed) shells
https://www.bonappetit.com/story/juiced-lemon-puree
I make a lemon loaf that has fresh-squeezed lemon juice and freshly-grated lemon zest in the batter. (I think it might have been Ina Garten’s recipe, but its origins are lost to the mists of time now.) When the loaves are still warm (about 15 minutes out of the oven), poke some holes in the tops of the loaves, mix some more fresh lemon juice with confectioners sugar until the mixture is fairly liquid and then drizzle it over the tops of the loaves (it will drip down the sides too). It’s the tangy lemon drizzle (that hardens as the loaves cool) that really makes this bread—which, thanks to the juice & zest in the batter, is a lovely pale yellow color.
Looks delicious!
Last summer I inadvertently purchased 4 bags of lemons, rather 4 single lemons, while making a grocery pick up order. When I had an empty Saturday and an excessive amount of lemons that were going to go bad soon I ended up zesting and juicing the lot. I’ve read that you can freeze the zest on its own, but I mixed some up with sugar in the food processor for lemon sugar, then processed zest and butter together, separated that into sticks of 4 oz each, and froze the sticks. Then I used the butter in baking and made herbed lemon butter a couple times. Froze the juice in ice cube trays and made a “lemonade concentrate” with some of the lemon juice, honey, vanilla, and lavender that I’m sure would have frozen well but it got used up before I could try.
Every time I end up with an excessive amount of something, prepping it for freezing and using later has served me better than trying to actually use it up. A few years ago after an over productive trip to a U-Pick blueberry farm with baby cousins I ended up with 40 pounds of fresh, ripe, amazing blueberries. Kept trying to find recipes to use them up and would reject some because they didn’t use enough. Finally just made jam and froze a bunch and without the pressure of trying to use as many as possible got to try dozens of new to me blueberry recipes!
On the subject of breeding does not equal good manners, there’s a fabulous lecture on exactly why this isn’t true in “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” from The Canterbury Tales– written in 1386! The main character (a fairy queen in disguise as an old lady) lectures a very badly behaved young man while they are in bed together. I teach the story in my British Literature class, and it always drives a good class discussion.
As far as lemon bars are concerned, the best recipe is one I think I saw recommended on this site last year, from the LadiesAPlate site: https://www.ladiesaplate.co.nz/recipes/squares-and-slices/lemon-bars.html
I have … somewhere … a recipe for lemon quick bread that is made with lemon-infused oil (I had some, which I used up for this very recipe) and also has the lemon juice/confectioners sugar glaze. It’s yummy … and if I could find lemon-infused oil again, I’d probably hunt it up.
For Alexandra, I saw a posting that was kind of the opposite of what happened to you – someone ordered one pound of green beans and received one bean.
I enjoyed the Sins of the City trilogy. The heroes (and a heroine) get happy endings, the bad guys don’t.
I am hoping my lemon tree survives after our below freezing temps in southeast Texas. It survived 30 degrees but I’m not sure about 15 degrees, even though I wrapped it in a freeze cloth, two sheets and a blanket around the trunk. Anyway, I had to pick all the lemons before the freeze and after giving many away I peeled the lemons for dried lemon zest and squeezed them and froze the juice.
Lemon brownies! Basically lemon cake with a wonderful lemon glaze and so easy! https://www.iheartnaptime.net/lemon-brownies/#wprm-recipe-container-71367
Are those Meyer lemons? The color and the way the pith shows through where they’ve come off the tree suggest that to me. If so, you need to adjust the sugar in recipes because they aren’t as tart at “regular” lemons.
A friend once dumped about twice that number on my back porch, and using them before the got moldy (Meyers don’t keep as well as other lemons, either) was a real challenge.
I made:
Limoncello
Lemon jam (much easier than marmalade, and sweetened with honey: https://foodinjars.com/recipe/honey-sweetened-meyer-lemon-jam/)
Lemon curd. And then when I couldn’t make any more lemon curd, I took the juice/zest for the recipe, put it in single batch baggies and froze them
Meyer lemon marshmallows (substituting lemon juice for water). Delicious!
Candied lemon peel, preserved lemons. Oh, and this showed up on my feed a couple of days ago: https://www.bestrecipes.com.au/entertaining/galleries/easy-lemon-dessert-recipes/dv3shg9z?fbclid=IwAR3r-xMJTw3NBtYBWVoTOyZQOJdvr5QhWiIYl2ATmRPHsk5TFmnXBZ0tJ_0
North African-style preserved lemons for use in savory food
On a tangent about controversial margarine — in Murder Must Advertise, Peter Wimsey has to write advertising copy for margarine. There’s a conversation about how the ad can’t claim that margarine is better than butter. Of course, he eventually comes up with the perfect catch phrase.
Love this post. Back when my parents had a lemon tree, lemon bars were my go-to recipe. The recipe I use resembles your. Hint – zest the lemons you juiced and add zest to both the crust and the filling. It adds a great punch of flavor.
This recipe doesn’t use much lemon, sorry, but it always gets raves from very particular cookie fans:
https://www.chef-in-training.com/lemon-cookies/
This recipe uses one entire lemon and is as wonderful as all SmittenKitchen’s are:
https://youtu.be/annwWhjm8fI
I’m jealous! Besides lemonade, I would squeeze and freeze some juice, and make lemon curd, and lemom meringue pie, and dry some of the peel for flavoring.
I learned how to make a super easy Japanese style chicken soup from a college roommate. Basically you just boil a whole chicken, cut in pieces. Once it’s cooked, take out the chicken, remove the skin and bones and add the meat back to the pot. Add lots of soy sauce and lemon juice. Just keep adding both until it reaches the flavor you want. You don’t need salt or anything else, it tastes incredible with just those 2 additions. Then add a chopped Napa cabbage, boil until it’s done to your taste, and serve over cooked rice. You don’t need salt because the soy sauce has plenty. But use a good quality soy sauce, not La Choy! It’s great for a cold.
Middle Eastern style lentil and spinach soup uses lots of lemon juice too. There are many variations, but this is the closest I see online to the way I make it, except I add medium grain cracked bulgur wheat. https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/163438/adas-bil-hamod-lebanese-lentil-lemon-soup/
I make this recipe for chicken with lemons all the time: https://www.tastingtable.com/cook/recipes/braised-chicken-thighs-with-garlic-lemon-and-greek-olives-r
If they are meyer lemons, you can make a lemon shaker pie and use the whole lemon! I don’t have a recipe on hand but Magpie Pie Bakery has a great book that I think has one.
There’s also Greek avgholemono (? spelling?) soup – it’s a chicken-based soup with lemon.
Can we have more knitting pairings? With recipes, with books, I am not picky. I seem to be good at accumulating books to read and yarn/patterns to knit so why not combine the two?
Avogolemono, is my favorite soup! The egg is tempered in at the end making it really creamy and silky and delicious. It is a personal favorite althouugh my lone attempt to make it myself was interesting. The recipe I tried was from one of those church cookbooks from the Greek Orthodox Church. It started with boil a whole chicken to make broth…I did not have time or a whole chicken. And it did not say to use chicken stock, which in retrospect makes sense because I was supposed to make stock in the first step I fudged. And finally I over beat the egg and ended up with foamy lemon chicken soup which was lightly chicken flavored.
Avogolemono from restaurants in Florida? 10/10. Avogolemono from my sad first attempt? 3/10 Edible, but not what I was trying to acheive.
I will master this recipe eventually!
Lemon Marmalade. We have a Meyer lemon tree in our yard and we use up excess lemons by making lemon marmalade. So good on toast, and mixed into plain yogurt, or Greek yogurt. (And yeah- grew up in Wisconsin mixing the coloring into the white margarine that my mom would buy…)
@Sandra—it amazes me that Dorothy Sayers wrote both fantastic mysteries AND great advertising copy for MURDER MUST ADVERTISE (okay, and she did the Penguin translation of Dante.) What an incredible woman.
@Lori — lemon marmalade is a lot of work, I think the lemon jam I posted above is easier when you are trying to use up a lot of lemons.
I, too, prefer to flavor my own yogurt.
Thanks for a delicious post, Shana! I’m enjoying the comments, too.
The sight of all of those lemons has made me YEARN. It is March, I am from the north county, and the weather cannot decide if it’s spring or winter.
These lemon poppy scones are easy to make. Double the dough but not the frosting if you prefer things not super-sweet.
Lazy me makes a big flatbread of the whole thing and cut it into bite sized pieces while it’s still hot and soft straight out of the oven. Then brush with the frosting as it cools.
https://www.budgetbytes.com/lemon-poppy-seed-two-bite-scones/
@FashionablyEvil Dorothy Sayers actually worked as an advertising copywriter, she was responsible for one of the Guiness strap lines, maybe “Guiness is Good for You”, but I couold easily be remembering the wrong one
An inconvenient heir book: The Unknown Ajax by Georgette Heyer.
Lemons: there’s not much that can’t be made better by lemon zest. But when I have a bunch of lemons to use, I make yuzu kosho: https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.bonappetit.com/entertaining-style/trends-news/article/yuzu-kosho-recipe/amp
I use a recipe I printed almost a decade ago, but I can’t find it anymore 🙁 The site might be dead.
There’s also a lemon, olive oil and rosemary cake I looove, but I don’t do it often; the lemony taste is too strong for the kids and I mostly end up eating it all by myself (not a hardship) (hence the “not-too-often”)
Martha Stewart has a fantastic lemon bar recipe that I tweaked and now love even more. I also tried it with key lime lime juice, and it was amazing.
2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted, divided use
1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted, plus more for dusting
3/4 cup unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
6 large eggs
3 cups granulated sugar
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 teaspoons vanilla, divided use
Heat oven to 325 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 1 teaspoon vanilla and confectioners’ sugar. Cut in butter until mixture resembles a coarse meal. Gently pat mixture into a 9-by 13-inch glass baking dish, and bake until crust is golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes. Transfer dish to a rack to cool.
Reduce oven temperature to 300 degrees. Whisk together eggs and sugar in a medium bowl. Add lemon juice, and combine. Sift in remaining flour, and stir to combine. Add vanilla. Pour filling onto baked crust, and bake until filling sets, about 40 minutes.
Refrigerate until well-chilled before slicing, at least one hour and up to overnight. Before slicing, dust with confectioners’ sugar.
This lemon Bundt cake with lemon icing and a lemon infusion was the King Arthur Flour recipe of the year a few years ago. My husband and sons made it for me one memorable Mother’s Day and I still dream of it. https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/lemon-bliss-cake-recipe
Lemon juice keeps well in the fridge and zest in the freezer. You could probably freeze the juice too, if you can’t bake enough to go through it all.