Lemon cream. Lemon Curd

How to make lemon curd .

The dessert recipe today is one of those that was a necessity, in my father ‘s house we have several lemon trees and this year, to mention a decent crop.

It is true that I love lemon, but normally I only use it to flavor desserts and salty recipes. I had to find a recipe that would give me so much lemon.

And one of the discoveries within English pastry that I liked the most was the lemon curd,  a lemon cream that is prepared based on lemon juice, sugar, eggs and butter.

It is a super creamy preparation, thanks to the butter, thick thanks to the egg and with a super characteristic flavor between sweet and acid due to the lemon juice with sugar.

The combination of all the ingredients produces a cream, in my opinion, it is impressive.

Although it is not known exactly when the preparation of this sweet cream was devised, we know that it is already a recipe from at least the early nineteenth century, since the recipe appears in cookbooks from the epoch.

Both at that time and today, lemon curd is used as an accompaniment to the famous English scones   or traditional English muffins , the typical rolls to accompany at tea time, and as a filling for cakes and pastries such as the famous lemon pie , lemon bars or lemon curd-filled muffins .

If you want to innovate we can prepare curds of other fruits such as oranges, blackberries, blueberries, passion fruit or lime .

Although in the past its preservation was delicate, today we can refrigerate or vacuum-preserve this cream, so that nothing prevents us from being able to enjoy it at home on a daily basis.

I recognize my vice of taking it with plain yogurt, delicious. In any case, it is increasingly easy to find this curd marketed on large surfaces, although of course, with preservatives and thickeners.

Preparation of lemon curd or lemon curd

1. In a saucepan that we can then put in a water bath, mix all the ingredients. Beat until well incorporated.
2. We put the water on medium low temperature, without it boiling at any time. We cook the cream in a double boiler, stirring constantly. In a few minutes we see how it will begin to thicken and acquire consistency.
3. Depending on the degree of hardness we want, we can cook the lemon curd more or less time. We have to take into account that once cold the cream will thicken a lot more.
4. We can pour the cream in sterilized jars and keep them in a vacuum, so we will always have it on hand to enjoy.
5. If you are going to prepare preserves with it, it is important that it is cold.
6. I use glass jars to later heat the bain-marie so that it does not spoil over time.
7. It can last up to a whole year, as I said, it depends on how much you like this lemon cream at home.
8. If you like lemon and lemon desserts, either as part of a cake or dessert or simply to eat it by the tablespoon, I assure you that it is delicious.

A  perfect sweet recipe to enjoy this addictive cream.

Here you have a step by step in photos where I show how to prepare this lemon curd recipe . Do not miss any detail so that it comes out perfect.

Conservation of lemon curd cream

A perfect way to have lemon curd throughout the year and take advantage of that surplus of lemons that in my case give us 3 lemon trees in Galicia.

Once perfectly sterilized and closed you can have them for a whole year or even longer.

1. We can prepare a lot of quantity and, as I mentioned above, make canned lemon curd.
2. For this we put the lids of the cans where we are going to prepare our preserves to cook in water. As soon as the first bubbles begin, we remove and reserve.
3. Hot, fill with lemon curd (room temperature) without being full, leave a little space between the cream and the lid. We are covering the boats with their corresponding cover.
4. We place the closed jars in a large pot with water, which overflows about 5 cm to the jars.
5. We make a first layer, we put a rag. We put a second layer of cans, ensuring that the water is always above the cans.
6. We cook in a bain-marie for at least 10 minutes. At the end of that time the fire goes out.
7. We let them cool in that container. During this process, a bottle may leak liquid, it is normal nothing happens.
8. Once cold, we dry and store our boats in a clean, dry place where the light does not give it much light.
9. First we will place them inverted (with the lid down) to promote sealing. And in about a week we turn them around.
10. We will already have our perfect lemon curd preserves to consume in our desserts or at breakfast.