Lemon Bar Tragedy

At first I was going to cross-post this on the World Foodies blog, but I just couldn’t stand to have my reputation there tarnished by this tragic episode of lemon bar production.

The recipe is really quite simple: it’s just a shortbread with a lemon custard on top. Margot on the Best Of Bridge site calls it “A very easy fool-proof recipe.” SherryL seconds that with “Very yummy; very easy!” Well, it just wasn’t so. I think my 70s oven runs a bit hot, so at the recommended temperature the shortbread came out quite crispy. We decided to forge ahead, vowing to at least scrape off the delicious lemony custard if the shortbread was too awful to consume. Well, the custard came out decent, but we took it out of the oven and set it on top of my stove without realizing that the burner I just finished pan-frying chicken on was still running full-blast. Smells of burning pastry filled the air and the lemony custard began to vent like a steaming volcano on the verge of eruption. So, after we pulled it off, the whole thing was a crispy mess. The shortbread was quite seriously black. We tried to salvage some of the custard, but the shortbread had infused it with a savoury scent of burnt cigarettes that made it largely inedible. Alas, the quest for lemon bars ended in tragedy.

Anything that occurs in my kitchen is on my record, but Fruit Loops was kinda in charge of the lemon bars, so I can selfishly shed some of the responsibility. Isn’t that right, Fruit Loops?