Lemon Cornflake Slice

Rules to live by #1: You can never ever have too many lemons. Add to that, raspberries, passionfruit and cream chesse. Okay, the rest are entirely optional…

If you’re a reader of my blog, you will know I’m rather passionate about recipes that use lemon juice, rind, or zest.

So, for all you lemon lovers out there, here is yet another recipe for lemon slice I found in the weekend. This one is slightly chewy, fruity and particularly moreish. It slices up really well and is very deserving of a big slab of thick lemony icing! No holding back here 🙂

Happy Friday!

Lemon Cornflake Slice
Makes 32 pieces

Base:

• 100 g butter
• 2 tbsp golden syrup
• ¾ cup sugar
• ¾ cup coconut
• 1 cup cornflakes
• 1 cup rolled oats
• ¾ cup white plain flour
• 1 ½ tsp baking powder

Lemon icing:

• 2 tbsp butter
• 1 cup icing sugar
• 3 tbsp lemon zest
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

Preheat oven to 180°C. In a large saucepan melt butter, golden syrup and sugar together. Add remaining ingredients, and blend well.

Press the mixture into a greased 20cm x 30cm slice pan and bake for 15-20 minutes. Once the slice has cooled to room temperature, ice.

For the icing, beat together butter and icing sugar until smooth. Blend in the lemon juice and lemon zest. Spread over the base.

Slice up when the icing has set and store in an air-tight container.

This is my entry for Sweet New Zealand this month. Head along to The Kitchen Maid and check out all the super tasty entries on offer! Click here to enter!

Yo-Yo’s with Lemon Filling

I made these the other night…and they’re delicious. I don’t think I know anyone that doesn’t love a yo-yo! Or do you call them a melting moment? Maybe even a custard cream…

I can never tell the difference or rather, never really *thought* about the difference between the two. It wasn’t until someone said to me:

“Ah, you made melting moments!”

“Err, well, no, they’re yo-yo’s”…

I’ve heard many things since.

The truth is there is very little difference between the two, except apparently for a yo-yo to be a true yo-yo, it needs to have custard powder in the biscuit mixture. Others say that melting moments are just much softer in texture.

I also think it might be another case of what household you grew up in, or what side of the world you dwell on, like plenty of other things in life!

What I do know for sure is that they are both nearly shortbread-like biscuits with lemony icing sandwiched between.

Whether you call them a yo-yo or a melting moment, this recipe is sure to please! Enjoy.

Thanks to The New Zealand Herald for the recipe.

Yo-Yo’s with Lemon Filling
Makes 18

• 170g butter, softened
• 1/4 cup icing sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups plain flour
• 1/4 cup custard powder

Lemon filling

• 50g butter, softened
• 1/2 cup icing sugar
• 2 Tbs custard powder
• 2 tsp finely grated lemon zest

Preheat the oven to 180C. Grease or line an oven tray with baking paper.

Cream the butter, icing sugar and vanilla together until pale.

Sift the flour and custard powder together then gently fold into the creamed mixture. Roll teaspoonfuls of the mixture into balls, flatten slightly then place on the tray. Bake for approximately 15 minutes or until lightly golden. Let cool.

To make the filling; beat all the ingredients together until smooth then use to sandwich the biscuits together. If you like, you can dust with icing sugar before serving. Enjoy!

Lemon Biscuit Slice

Right now, I should be packing for my trip, but I felt like sharing this recipe with you instead.

I know I’ve blogged a lot about slices on After Taste in the past so I really don’t need to go into just how much I appreciate a good piece of old-fashioned slice.

But while slices are simple in theory, countless cafes and bakeries just can’t seem to nail it. The base is often terribly crumbly, or dry and the all-important icing-to-base ratio is often out. So your best bet for a tasty wee morsel is generally one you just make, yourself, at home.

From memory this uncooked lemon biscuit slice is a total crowd pleaser. It is quite moist, with a coconutty base and a soft, sweet lemon icing. It is really simple to make and requires absolutely no baking!

Tell me, what is your favourite slice recipe?

Lemon Biscuit Slice
Makes 24 pieces

Base:

• 250 grams wine biscuits
• 1 cup desiccated coconut
• Finely grated zest of 1-2 lemons
• 120 grams butter
• 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk

Lemon icing:

• 2 cups icing sugar, sifted
• 40g butter, melted
• Juice of 1 lemon

Grease and line a 17 x 27cm slice tin with baking paper, leaving an overhang on all sides. Place biscuits in a food processor and process to form fine crumbs.

Transfer the mixture to a bowl, then combine with coconut and lemon rind. Place butter in a small saucepan over medium heat to melt. Stir in condensed milk. Pour melted mixture over the dry ingredients. Stir to combine well.

Press biscuit mixture into prepared tin. Refrigerate for one hour or until firm. When set, ice with lemon icing. To make lemon icing, place the icing sugar in a bowl. Add melted butter and lemon juice and beat until smooth.

Mini Lemon Meringue Pies

Lemon Meringue Pie is actually a pretty stunning dessert. Mini lemon meringue pies are even better! I can’t remember ever having had lemon meringue pie because I usually always choose cheesecake over other desserts. There is something about cheesecake, I am never left dissatisfied. Amen.

I borrowed this recipe from New Zealand Woman’s Weekly and it was relatively easy to follow. Last Sunday night I was feeling a little bit creative and decided to make mini lemon meringue pies. I was really reeeeeally happy with the way these turned out – the serving size was just perfect and paired with a spoonful of natural yoghurt or a scoop of vanilla ice cream….you have yourself a dessert made in heaven!

The lemon filling is very similar to lemon curd so you could just as easily pre-make lemon curd and use when needed. Time saving tips for busy December…

Have fun with these little bundles of lemony sweet joy!

Mini Lemon Meringue Pies

• 300g sweet short pastry
• 4 eggs, separated
• 1 cup water
• Finely grated zest and juice of 3 lemons
• 1 cup sugar
• 15g butter
• 1/4 cup cornflour
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• Icing sugar, to dust

Roll out pastry to 3mm thick and use to line a 12-hole muffin pan. Prick the base of each pastry shell with a fork and then chill for at least 30 minutes.

Heat the oven to 200°C. Line each pastry case with baking paper or foil and fill with baking beans (or rice like me!) to blind bake for 15 minutes, then remove paper and beans/rice and return pastry cases to the oven for a further five minutes to dry out. Remove to cool.

Place the egg yolks, water, lemon juice and zest, sugar, butter and cornflour into a saucepan. Cook over a gentle heat for 5 to 10 minutes, stirring continuously until mixture thickens like custard. Remove to cool.

Spread lemon custard mixture into cooked pastry case. Place egg whites in a bowl and with an electric mixer, beat until stiff. Slowly add caster sugar a little at a time, beating well until thick meringue is formed.

Spread meringue over custard to cover completely. Bake at 200°C for 10 to 15 minutes, just until tips of meringue are lightly browned. Dust with icing sugar and slice to serve.

Old-Fashioned Lemony Shortbread

There is nothing quite like a good “bickie”. The old-fashioned Yo-Yo, Belgian or the famous Shrewsbury biscuit are a few of my favourites. I think it might be because they are all sandwich-style biscuits with a layer of cream or icing in between. Delicious!

So when I saw a recipe for these tangy lemony treats last week I knew I had to try them out. I also had a set of cookie cutters I was given that I could finally put to work (yay!).

These little biscuits are actually heavenly! They are soft, light and crumbly and require very few ingredients. I can almost guarantee that you have everything you need to make them. There is something nice about being able to make a batch of biscuits on the whim and with ingredients already in the cupboard!

I found these biscuits take a little bit more extra labour than your typical ANZAC or Afghan recipe but make up for time in flavour! I did somewhat make more work for myself, too, when I decided to make 40-odd wee miniature little stars rather than a dozen or so bigger ones but worked out really well. I quite like how the lemon zest is still quite visible once baked, though you could easily cut the zest up a wee bit smaller if so desired!

Old-fashioned lemony shortbread

• 130g very soft butter
• 1/2 cup sifted icing sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 1 cup of self-raising flour
• 1/2 cup cornflour
• pinch of salt
• zest of 1 lemon, finely grated
• extra icing sugar for dusting

Put butter, icing sugar and vanilla in a bowl. Beat until pale and creamy. Don’t rush this step. Sift together flour, cornflour and salt. With beaters running, add the dry ingredients in three lots. Add the lemon zest and beat until fully combined.Turn mixture out onto a lightly floured board. Form into a ball and refrigerate for 20 minutes. Halve the dough and roll out the first portion on a lightly floured surface, or between sheets of baking paper, until about 5mm thick. Cut with a cookie cutter. If you want to, you can cut a small circle or shape out of every second biscuit if desired – like a Shrewsbury!

Place biscuits on baking sheets lined with baking paper. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes at 180° and cool on a wire rack. Repeat process with second portion of dough. Make sure your re-roll any scraps and cut again.

For the lemon icing:

Combine 50 grams of softened butter with 1 1/2 cups sifted icing sugar and 2 teaspoons of finely grated lemon zest. Beat together with a few drops of boiling water to make a spreading consistency. Sandwich biscuits together with lemon curd or icing and dust with icing sugar!

Make sure you store these biscuits (though they are not likely to last terribly long!) in a sealed container! I thought this recipe could work really well as a small gift for friends or family. Christmas, after all, is just around the corner! Hmmm…

Bit of a poll this time round, what is your favourite biscuit of all time? A kiwi creation or otherwise!

Lemon Slice

Just when you thought I’d put away the lemon card, I draw it out once more.

A few people have asked me for the other slice recipe I seem to mention so much! It is full of deliciousness and the colour is as rich and golden as the sunshine so really does remind me of Summer….ok, much warmer weather than we are currently experiencing in Wellington anyway!!

Thanks to Ellie Won and her blog Kitchen Wench for this one! I discovered her blog a couple of months ago and now read it weekly. Seriously if you haven’t checked it out, please do! Beautiful photography too. I must say I am quite looking forward to trying out her Maple Syrup and Walnut Cake one day soon. I will add to the list!

Luscious Lemon Slice

For the base

• 225g of all-purpose flour
• 80g icing sugar, sifted
• 180g unsalted butter
• Finely grated zest of 1 lemon
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tsp iced water

For the topping

• 6 large eggs
• 600g of caster sugar
• Finely grated zest of 3 lemons
• 250ml freshly squeezed lemon juice, strained
• 1/2 cup of flour
• Icing sugar, chopped pistachios or fresh berries and cream to serve

Preheat your oven to 180° and line a 25 cm baking tin with baking paper. Put the flour, icing sugar and lemon zest in a food processor and pulse until well mixed. Add the butter and pulse till the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs, then add the vanilla and water till the pastry forms a ball. Press the dough mixture evenly into the lined tin.

Bake the base for about 15-20 minutes, or till the edges have gone golden and the pastry has dried a fair bit and firmed up. While the pastry is baking, lightly beat together the eggs, sugar, lemon zest and juice. Sift the flour over the top and whisk until the mixture is smooth!

Once the base is cooked, remove from the oven and set aside for about 10 minutes to cool and drop the oven temperature down to 150°. Once the base has cooled, briefly whisk the egg mixture and pour over the base. Carefully return to the oven and bake for 35-45 minutes, or till the topping has set. Once baked, remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack.

I recommend covering the tin tightly with cling film and keep in the fridge for up to 3-4 days. Bring back to room temperature before serving. I decided to decorate my slice with a light dusting of icing sugar and a few small pieces of Whittaker’s Dark Chocolate. There really is something about the combination of lemon and dark chocolate.

Mmmm, enjoy!

And…after discovering some new weird and wonderful kiwi food blogs through entering Sweet New Zealand last month, I’ve decided to enter this very nice summery slice in November. Nothing like a bit of sunshine yellow to get us through to the start of Summer!

Sweet New Zealand for November is hosted by Mairi at Toast. Go and visit her blog to see what the country has been cooking up!

Lemon Sour Cream Cupcakes

It is Sunday afternoon and the All Blacks are just about to go head to head with Canada. I do watch the odd game of Rugby and I am 100% behind the All Blacks like the rest of New Zealand. With an abundant supply of homemade lemon curd in the fridge, it is the perfect time to make something delicious to eat while watching the game. Although this recipe is technically for a cake, they make perfect little cupcakes.

Lemon Sour Cream Cupcakes

• 125 g butter, softened
• 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup Edmonds plain baking flour
• 1 teaspoon Edmonds baking powder
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• Icing sugar

Beat butter, lemon rind, sugar and eggs together until light and fluffy. Sift flour and baking powder together and fold sifted ingredients into egg mixture alternately with sour cream, mixing until smooth.

Pour mixture into a greased muffin tin.

Bake at 160°C for 45 minutes (usually less than this!) or until cupcakes spring back when lightly touched. Leave in tin for 5-10 minutes before turning out onto a cooling rack. Once the cupcakes have been baked and cooled, a hole is made in the centre of each cupcake and fill with a small spoon of lemon curd. Plug the hole with the cupcake lid to seal.

Lastly, I adore the combination of dark chocolate and lemon. It is delicious, but I find that it is rarely combined. Once the cupcakes have been iced, I decorate the top with a shard of dark chocolate. I hope you enjoy making this recipe as much as I do.

Easy Lemon Curd

I’m not going to lie. I love lemons. They are probably one of my favourite ingredients to bake with, especially those sourced from my parents lemon tree in Palmerston North. I am a bit of a raider really, whenever I go home and their tree is in full-fruit-producing glory, I take more than my fair share.

So many in fact, I sometimes struggle to think of ways to use them all up and let’s face it, lemons do not last forever. A long standing favourite I make with lemons is a really moist lemon sour cream cake from the Edmond’s Cookery Book, which I often turn into cupcakes, a lemon slice from Kitchen Wench or my Mum’s lemon cordial recipe.

Recently I bought a jar of the delicious Lemon Curd from the Barker’s range. Seriously addictive stuff and I soon found there is nothing better than Lemon Curd on Vogel’s…amen. Barkers are based in Geraldine and wherever I can, I try to buy New Zealand made.

With lemon curd fresh on my palette, I wanted to see how easy it was to make my own. It proved quite difficult to find a recipe that wasn’t high in sugar, until I found this one (thanks to @Shadowfoot). This  recipe is easy enough to do while making dinner and uses a whole egg without needing to separate the white from the yolk, or find a way of using up the whites…

Easy Lemon Curd

• 1 cup Sugar
• 3 Eggs
• 1 tablespoon Lemon Zest
• ½ cup Lemon Juice
• 50g Butter, softened and chopped into small pieces

Beat the eggs and sugar together until well combined. Next beat in lemon juice and the lemon zest.

Beat in the butter, bearing in mind it will appear lumpy and don’t try to make it smooth. Microwave on high for up to 8 minutes, until fairly thick, whisking roughly every 2 minutes. Pour into hot clean jars and seal immediately. This recipe was doubled and ended up making three jars which is plenty.

Homemade lemon curd makes a wonderful gift but if you don’t wish to make your own lemon curd, I seriously recommend trying out the Barker’s lemon curd or any of their spreads for that matter. Today I discovered a recipe for Lemon Curd Cheesecake I cannot wait to try. Until next time.