meyer lemon bars

This was originally posted on my other blog in November 2010 and because things have been insanely busy around here lately I'm doing the lazy thing and reposting this here.  At the time I posted this we were still living in Koreatown, I wasn't working yet and so I did a lot of cooking and baking to keep myself occupied.  Leif ate really, really well for about six months.  Now he mostly eats Weight Watchers food (which isn't all that bad).

So with no further rambling on my part...

Everyone knows the old adage, "When life hands you a bowl of lemons, make lemonade."  Well, it just so happened that last week my sister gave me a large bowl of Meyer lemons from her tree* and so I decided to make lemon bars.  And because apparently a little lemon goes a long way, also lemon risotto, preserved lemons, and the proverbial lemonade.

I've never made lemon bars before.  As it turns out they are really easy to make as well as really, really tasty.  I'm talking about the type of tasty that effectively lobotomizes your frontal lobe, leaving you with the inability to understand the future consequences of eating too many of said lemon bars or at least the inability for caring about those consequences.  But, I can claim no responsibility for the way these turned out.  The kudos goes to the -essentially- idiot-proof recipe I followed. 

 I highly suggest that if you happen to find yourself the unexpected recipient of a booty of lemons you should try to make these bars.  You won't be sorry.  Well, after the fifth bar in a row you may be sorry but before that you will temporarily forget your troubles.  That ability, even if only temporary, is a welcome friend. And since I can't do anything -accept for, ahem, certain things- without taking photos, I present to you,  "When life hands you a bowl full of lemons, make lemon bars and then eat them until you aren't sad anymore," in photos.

Making the crust with a lot of butter.  Delicious, delicious, butter.

Raining powdered sugar.

My lemon bars had bald spots.  

Being enjoyed by my husband.  

*There are really only two things you can count on living in southern California.  One is that at nearly any time of the day you will be subjected to an excruciatingly slow drive in freeway traffic.  The other is that someone you know has a citrus fruit tree of some sort whose fruit is going unused and rotting on the tree.  This is the case with my next door neighbor (but not my sister) and her beautiful lemon tree.  I would ask her for lemons but I don't speak a word of Korean (aside from Hello) and she doesn't speak a word of English.  Oh well.