Lemon Curd

Lemon curd is a thick citrusy sauce of velvety texture. This luscious, smooth and creamy curd can be spread on toasts, lemon cakes, cup cakes, drizzled over ice creams, cakes, scones, tarts and also used to sandwich macarons. As lemons are the prime ingredient and the one that dominates the flavour use fresh lemons that are plumb, juicy, firm and don’t have any blemishes on them. Fresh lemons contributes a lot to the flavour of the sauce, so, do not replace fresh lemon with the bottles ones you get in stores.

As the lemon curd calls for cooking of eggs, I cooked it over a saucepan of simmering water instead of stove top cooking. You can also cook it over stovetop on a very low heat with constant stirring to prevent scrambling. But, if you leave it unnoticed, you might end up having some scrambled eggs in the mixture. To be on the safe side, it is always best to pass the sauce through a strainer once done to get rid of any lumps. Cover with a cling film to avoid a film forming on the surface and let keep refrigerated. You can also freeze this.

Lemon Curd

Ingredients:

3 egg yolks

1 large egg

½ cup (100g) sugar

¼ cup lemon juice (Juice of 1 ½ large lemons)

50g cold butter, diced in small pieces

Finely grated zest of 1 or 2 lemons

2 tsp corn flour, mixed in 2 tbsp water

Preparation:

1. Place yolks, egg, lemon juice, corn flour mixture and sugar in a bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water. Cook till curd is thick and creamy and coats the back of the spoon. Make sure you stir constantly through out to avoid the egg scrambling.

2. Remove from heat and strain to remove any lumps. Stir in butter and mix well until butter is melted and the curd is smooth and velvety.

3. Pour into a bowl, cover with a cling wrap right on the surface and let it chill in the fridge till ready to use.

4. When ready to use, stir a little with a spoon or spatula to loosen the texture. Put in a piping bag and pipe as you wish.