Comments on: lemon bars

By: Rebecca

Rebecca — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 02:40:06 +0000

WOW is all i can say after making these lemon bars. they are not too tart, but not too sweet. I made them for a new years party and everyone loved them!!!!!

By: Deb

Deb — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 19:32:53 +0000

Love this recipe. Works perfectly for me, no hitches, using a heavy ceramic baking dish I normally use for baking lasagne’s, etc. For greasing the pan, I used Canola Oil spray and gave the entire pan a heavy dose. Worked very well. I found that a tiny bit more sugar in the crust (making it the second time) was a lively, pleasant enhancement. This recipe is delicious and after 2 days covered tightly in the fridge, the cutting became easier with each section and the bars were even more tasty.Time is on the side of this recipe.The bars stayed very fresh tasting for 5 days in the fridge. I suspect they would last even longer with no issues, so long as kept in an air tight container in the fridge. Second time around, I added an additional 1/3 c of lemon juice. Simply love the tart/sweet combination and it worked well, not being too tart for our tastes. There is plenty of sugar in this recipe so a little extra lemon did no harm at all. Thanks for your efforts at risking an adjustment to Ina Garten’s recipe. I loved her’s too, but this one suits our tastes more.

By: Shanti

Shanti — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 00:17:14 +0000

Oh, Deb, your lemon bars look lovely…and unfortunately, nothing at all like mine turned out to be.

I decided to make the thinner layer of filling. First of all (and this is only a minor complaint, and probably my fault) I had a hard time getting the crust to come together. It’s most likely due to my inexperience with crusts like this, but it was awfully crumbly and lost its shape quite a bit during the first browning. But secondly, I, like a few others on here, had a sticky, cake-like top. It’s quite annoying–where do I put the powdered sugar if there’s no sticky layer to adhere to? And this top layer tastes very sickly-sweet, I’m tempted to knife it off before the company arrives…do you have any ideas what I could do differently to avoid this in the future? If not, I’ll (unfortunately) have to write this recipe off and move on to another lemon bar recipe.

By: Jenine

Jenine — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 15:27:13 +0000

These were a disaster! I wish I knew what I did wrong, but I made this nice wall in the dough and then the lemon topping (thin version) spilled out all over the cookie sheet, the oven, the counters, the floor. So I tried to take the whole mess and put it in a ready made pie shell (for shame, but to save the topping at least). But the pie shell was too old and dry, so it crumbled, I then took the crust from the ruined bar recipe with a bit of topping and plopped it all in a pie dish, then put the rest of the topping on top of it, and baked it lower and longer than called for and VIOLA, my husband and daughters claim the most delicious lemon pie they’ve ever tasted.
Where did I go wrong, I just had not enough dough to make the crust I think? It’s all o.k. in the end, but that topping went EVERYWHERE.

By: Nada

Nada — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 00:48:47 +0000

I love it! I made it and my family went crazy for it. However, it tasted eggy! Anyone had this problem?

By: Alissia

Alissia — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 03:13:54 +0000

I’ve loved lemon bars for as long as I could remember, but couldn’t bring myself to try the boxed mixes and always thought it was going to be way too complicated to even try from scratch. SO wrong! I used the modified version (thank you SO much for that) with some meyer lemons and they turned out great! The only issue is that I think my pan might’ve been a little too big or that either my hands or the dough were too warm, so I had a hard time getting the crust pressed evenly in the pan and the edge pieces show it (they are definitely still edible though). The modified recipe is the perfect crust to filling ratio for me, is nice and tart and I will definitely be telling friends about it. I’m also excited to try it with regular lemons for a little extra pucker. Oh, and the final cooking time for me with the modified filling recipe was 15-20 minutes.

By: Lindsay

Lindsay — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 20:28:46 +0000

My microplane Christmas present finally got some use! Although I zested only 2 large lemons and got more that enough zest for this recipe and the lemon-cranberry scones. These are wonderful! I slightly over-pre-baked the crust, so the top edges were a bit brown, but they are amazing! Tart, great texture, perfect crust! A day later, they are neither soggy nor gooey nor gummy, as many lemon bars become. As I’ve done before, I poured the crust crumbles directly into the pan and used the outside thumb knuckle to press the sides evenly, then pressed the remainder into the bottom.

By: Lothaire

Lothaire — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 18:39:27 +0000

I’ve had lots of lemon squares before, but this is by far the best! So sweet and lemon-y! One word to the wise, tho – don’t make a double-batch in a large cookie tray, because you WILL end up eating the whole thing, and you’re waistline will be the worse for it.

I re-found this recipe from the recently-posted poppy seed lemon cake, which I’ll be making this afternoon. Hopefully that one lives up to the expectations that these squares have raised!

By: Sara

Sara — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 23:03:17 +0000

I’ve made these four times now (my husband and friends are citrus freaks), and other than the first batch, when I overbaked the base and burned the edges, there’ve been nothing but positive comments on them. I do wonder why they come out a tad cakey on top and then gooier in the middle, but as no one seems to have a problem with the texture, I don’t care either. Thank you, Deb!

By: Larry

Larry — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 19:20:29 +0000

Just harvested (1 hr ago) 2 bright Meyer(s) lemons from a happy little tree that had been dormant for about 4 years. They are the first, and I want to do the best for them. This recipe looks nice, but the proportions on this (and many other) recipe throw me off . . have only (2), and they’re sooo beautiful!!