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Why You’ll Love My Recipe
Lemon tarts are a classic tea party treat. Make these in homemade tart shells for a whole other dimension of delicious flavour, and you may have an excellent reason to plan your next afternoon tea.
Make sure you make your very own Cream Cheese Pastry for this recipe. Why not add to the tart selection and make some Strawberry Tarts? Or whip up a batch of these classic Canadian Butter Tarts.
Reader Review
I forgot the photo, but these were so good. Not too sweet. Just right. I have never made lemon curd with the whole egg, so I thought the recipe was missing something. It was correct and delicious. Thank you.
Karlynn’s Recipe Notes
- Skill Level: This recipe is very easy. You don’t even have to separate any eggs for this lemon curd!
- Total Time: As long as you’ve prebaked your shells, this recipe should only take you about 15-20 minutes plus however long you’d like to chill your assembled tarts.
- Variations: The tartness of a good lemon curd goes well with most berries, so why not try adding a few fresh blueberries or blackberries to your tarts before pouring in the curd? Raspberries or sliced strawberries would also compliment the flavour profile. If you prefer a different type of pastry, or some store bought shells, just be sure to prebake and cool them before assembling the tarts.
- Tools Needed: For this recipe, you’ll need a medium bowl, a hand mixer or stand mixer, a medium pot, a spoon, and a whisk. Keep a sieve handy too, just in case.
What You’ll Need For Ingredients
Tart Shells: For these tarts, you can either make a batch of Cream Cheese Pastry and prepare shells in advance, or buy frozen ones from the store. I think the flavour of the cream cheese pastry adds a wonderful dimension to these tarts, but if cream cheese pastry isn’t your thing, try this Tenderflake Recipe for Pie Crust or The Best Pie Crust Recipe for your tart shells.
Lemon Curd: Lemon juice, eggs, sugar, and unsalted butter form this delicious filling. If you’ve ever made lemon bars or lemon meringue pie, you may already be familiar with the process. You can squeeze fresh lemon juice for this or use the stuff in a bottle.
How To Make Lemon Tarts
This is a brief overview of the recipe. The full list of ingredients and step-by-step instructions are in the recipe card below.
- In medium bowl, beat eggs and sugar together for 2 minutes. Add eggs and beat for another minute. Stir in the lemon juice. Don’t worry about the curdled look.
- Pour the lemon mixture into a medium pot. Cook over low heat until smooth. Turn heat up to medium. Cook at medium until the mixture starts to thicken. Stir or whisk constantly to avoid lumps.
- Remove from heat. Strain mixture through a sieve if there are any lumps. Let cool for 15-20 minutes.
- Fill tart shells 3/4 full and place in refrigerator to chill further.
Karlynn’s Tips and Tricks for Making Lemon Tarts
Thickening: If your lemon curd doesn’t seem thick enough, cook it for a little longer. Remember it will also thicken more as it cools. You should be able to dip a spoon in and have it coated with lemon curd when you pull it back out. You shouldn’t need any extra thickeners like cornstarch or flour for this recipe.
Make Them Pretty: A lemon tart is vibrant but rather plain to look at. if you want to add some colour or visual appeal, try garnishing your tarts with a leaf or two of mint or lemon balm. You could also add a dusting of icing sugar, a curl of lemon peel, or some lemon zest. If you happen to have any candied lemons or lemon peel available to you, this is a prime opportunity to use them.
Storage Instructions
Fridge: Since these tarts have eggs in them, they should be stored in the fridge in a sealed container. Store them this way for several days.
Freezer: Once cooled, you can store these tarts in a freezer safe container in your freezer for several months.
More Delicious Pie and Tart Recipes
Looking for more Tart recipes to try?
If you enjoy custard-based desserts, check out this Coconut Custard Easter Pie.
Have some leftover pumpkin puree? Try this Impossible Pumpkin Pie.
Make some classic Mincemeat Tarts with Butter Pastry or Butter Tart Bars.
There you go, everyone. A classic treat, perfect for tea parties and picnics. Try out this recipe and let me know how it turns out for you.
Happy Baking!
Karlynn
Lemon Tarts
Ingredients
Cream Cheese Pastry
- 1 batch Cream Cheese Pastry tart shells
Lemon Filling
- 1 cup lemon juice
- 6 eggs
- 1 1/2 cups sugar
- 1/2 cup salted butter
Instructions
Cream Cheese Pastry
- Prepare and bake one batch of cream cheese pastry tart shells.
Lemon Tart Filling
- In a medium bowl beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer for about two minutes, just like you do to make cookies.
- Slowly add the eggs then beat for one more minute.
- Stir in the lemon juice. The mixture will look curdled, but it will smooth out as it cooks.
- Place the mixture in a medium sauce pan and cook over low heat until it's smooth. Increase the heat to medium and cook, continuously stirring, until the mixture thickens. The mixture should stick to the spoon slightly.
- If there are any lumps, strain through a sieve.
- Let the mixture cool in the pot for 15-20 minutes
- Fill the cool tart shells 3/4 full with your lemon filling
- Place the tarts in the fridge and the lemon filling will thicken more as it cools
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Melissa says
Perfect lemon curd, and it does thicken if you let it bubble for several minutes. I used pre-made shells and everyone loved them!
Margaret says
Was too runny…had to redo with cornstarch.
Mary says
Very tasty curd. i had to add some cornstatch to thicken at the end.
yvette says
I forgot the photo, but these were so good. Not too sweet. Just right. I have never made lemon curd with the whole egg, so I thought the recipe was missing something. It was correct and delicious. Thank you.
Suzanne says
Why don’t you include the recipe for the pastry……..
Jillian says
Hi Suzanne! She does. The very first paragraphs of the blog where she mentions the other recipes, they are a bolder colour blue and bold, you just click on whichever recipe you want and it will then pop you right over. They are links. Hope this helps. She does this on almost recipe she puts up.
Denise says
that’s what I’m looking for too??!
bought ingredients, now no measurements