Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Eating my Curds

Lemons are the most maligned fruit in the English language. Take for example the following phrases, "when life gives you lemons..." or "you've bought(got) a lemon..", the English-speaking world is saying that you've gotten yourself a thoroughly bad deal!

And yet, where would we be without a bit of tart lemon juice or fragrant lemon zest to add that spark or zip to our tea or our pies, and who would eat curd unless it's delicious zesty and tangy lemon curd!
Pucker-UP
I have never been tempted to make lemon curd as the commercial ones I've tasted in the past were either too sour or didn't really catch my attention with their muted or zilch lemon fragrance. Having decided that I should not based my entire life experience with lemon curd on those commercially bottled curds, I tried my hand at 'curdling' and used this lemon curd recipe from the January 2001 issue of Gourmet(reproduced at this page on epicurious.com).

With just 4 ingredients: lemons, sugar, eggs and butter, a little wrist action (some frequent whisking required), and half an hour later, my very first batch of lemon curd appeared last Saturday and unfortunately, since then, I haven't been able to stop sneaking a tiny spoonful of luscious tangy sweetness out of that cheery sunny yellow bottle every now and then. Home-made lemon curd is bloody addictive!

Not wanting to finish the entire bottle of lemon curd by sneaking spoonfuls of it (no matter how tempting it might be), the baking supplies and utensils came out on full parade on Sunday and the result, raisin scones (pic on the left) and lemon madeleines (pic on the right).

Raisin Scones Lemon Madeleines
The recipe for raisin scones was from the March 2005 issue of Martha Stewart Living and it appeared to be healthy with the addition of wheat germ to the flour and the use of heavy cream in place of butter. It baked a tad too dry for my liking though (maybe, due to the lack of butter) but I do like the addition of wheat germ to the scones. Will probably need to do some tinkering to this recipe and if successful, will share it in future.

The lemon madeleines, on the other hand, turned out beautifully - light and spongy. Break one in half, spread a dollop of lemon curd over it, and if you are a fan of tangy sensations like me, it may be fairly difficult to stop at one. I adapted the lemon madeleine recipe from this blueberry madeleine recipe of Tyler Florence in his Eat This Book (one of my all-time favourites, both for the recipes and the gorgeous pictures of man and food). Instead of using orange zest, I added lemon zest and omitted the blueberries entirely.
Lemon Curd for Tea

Will need to take a break from lemon curd soon - am beginning to feel like little Miss Muffet sitting on her tuffet and eating her curds!

11 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

some how i prefer the taste & aroma of lime more then lemon. definitely love the scones & madeleines with espresso. having with lemon curds sounds very interesting :)

5/16/2006 11:40:00 PM  
Blogger boo_licious said...

Lemon curd is addictive. I kept eating them the last time I made hence I vowed not to make them for a while. The madelines look so beautiful.

5/17/2006 05:03:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

lovely complementary colour cath. Your posts are visually delicious as well as good eating. It must be fun to get to eat your props after the shoot :-)

5/17/2006 08:47:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

slurp! I like limes too, actually tough choice between the two but for curd, lemon seems the rigueur - never heard of lime curd :)

boo_licious, thanks, and I think I will follow suit - hold off on making more batches of lemon curd for awhile!

thanks pfong, as for the eating part - what can I say except YUMMMMM!

5/18/2006 10:10:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi eatzycath - I think you are very good at zesting :) The madeleines look absolutely delicious, I can almost taste the lovely lemon flavour.

5/18/2006 11:38:00 PM  
Blogger Joycelyn said...

hi cath, how beautiful! i am a huge citrus curd fan, and am equally big on madeleines...so i savoured every bit of this delicious post ;)

5/19/2006 02:04:00 PM  
Blogger Van Cong Tu said...

HI, I remembered that first tiem I ate lemon cake like this in Melbourne and i falling in love. I am not a big fan of lemon but i am right now. Your pictures are so so beautiful.

5/21/2006 09:26:00 AM  
Blogger FooDcrazEE said...

can i have some ? pleaseeeeeee ?

5/21/2006 05:34:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

hi keiko, a good lemon zester as the one shown in pic goes a long way to getting all that zest down pat :)

thanks a lot, Joycelyn.. after this lemon curd, I'm itching to try other types of citrus curds now!

hi VG, so happy that post brought back nice memories for you :)

anytime, foodcrazee, just drop by SG across the Causeway!

5/22/2006 12:40:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

wow madeleines have been huge lately!!
they are the CUTEST little shaped madeleines!!!!! wow :)

My friends mum uses cream in her scones... I will have to check out her recipe for you

5/29/2006 12:49:00 PM  
Blogger Babe_KL said...

i lurve lemon curd too and your lovely pics is making me salivating for some now!

5/29/2006 03:07:00 PM  

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