Lemon Crumble Bars

I really like lemon desserts, and I realized that I hadn’t made lemon cookies in quite a while. Most classic is lemon bars, which are always good, but they can be fussy to make. This bar cookie is quite similar to a classic lemon bar, but a little less fussy. The lemon punch is delivered via lemon curd, which you can make yourself of buy. It is on the expensive side, but the rest of the ingredients of these bars are pantry staples.

Since I always take the cookies I bake to work, bar cookies that bake in a 9” square pan don’t yield enough cookies to share with everyone. I doubled this recipe and baked the bars in a 9” x 13” pan. The bars end up being the same thickness, so the baking time remains the same.

These bars are so easy to make- they have so few ingredients. The texture of the dough is a little strange, but it packs nicely to make the base and crumbles well for the topping. Lemon curd, at least the type that I had, is super thick. I warmed mine in the microwave for about 20 seconds and that helped somewhat. Make sure you cool the bars completely before cutting, or you’ll have a big mess. These cookies have a wonderful, refreshing lemon flavor.

Lemon Crumble Bars

1/2 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1-1/2 cups flour

1 cup lemon curd

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9” square baking pan with foil and spray the foil with nonstick cooking spray.

In a large mixer bowl, combine the melted butter, sugar, and brown sugar. Stir on medium until combined. Gradually add the flour, mixing on low, until the mixture is crumbly. Reserve ¾ cup of the mixture. Press the remaining mixture evenly into the prepared pan. Top with the lemon curd. Sprinkle the remaining dough crumbs over the lemon curd.

Bake for about 40 minutes, until the topping is lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack for about 15 minutes. Place the pan in the refrigerator for at least an hour to fully chill the bars. Once chilled, remove the cookies from the pan and cut into bars.

Recipe from House of Yumm