Decorate This: Lemon Tart Part 1

My mom loves anything lemon - and this Mother's Day, I'll be making her this amazing lemon tart! This creamy, light tart is the perfect ending to a wonderful meal, and is fairly easy to put together. The tart requires only few ingredients, most of which you'll probably already have on hand.

The filling for this tart calls for Meyer lemon juice, but you can substitute regular lemon juice as well. Meyer lemons are thought to be a cross between a regular lemon and a mandarin orange, and are sweeter, milder, and less acidic than regular lemons. Due to their delicate nature, you may not be able to find these delightful citrus fruits in your regular grocery store; I'm lucky to have an amazing produce market close to my house that carries them. Feel free to substitute regular lemon juice if you like - the tart will be just as delicious, and a bit more tart!

Short on time? You can easily make a similar tart with store-bought materials. Instead of the pâte sucrée tart shell, use pre-made pie dough, and instead of the meyer lemon custard filling, use purchased lemon curd. Embellish as you like (some ideas below!)

Creamy Meyer Lemon Tart (Adapted from Tarte du Jour)
Serves 8-12

5 large eggs
2/3 cup Meyer lemon juice (may substitute regular lemon juice)
1/2 cup sugar
3 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon cream
1 pâte sucrée pre-baked (recipe coming soon)

1. Preheat oven to 325°F.
2. Crack eggs into a large bowl, and beat well with a whisk. Add the lemon juice, sugar and cream; whisk until completely smooth.
3. Pour mixture into a pre-baked 10" tart shell. Place the tart onto the center rack in your oven, being very careful not to spill the filling over the edge of the tart. You may find it easier to place the unfilled shell into the oven first, and then pour in the filling to avoid potential spillage; just take care not to burn yourself.
4. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until the filling is firm with a slight jiggle in the center. Pay close attention in the final minutes of baking; even slight overbaking can cause your tart to crack (if this happens, don't worry - see my decorating ideas below). It will continue to firm up after you take it out of the oven.
5. Let tart cool on a wire rack, and remove tart from pan.
6. Once cool, embellish your tart! After decorating, cover your tart with plastic wrap and chill before serving.

A few decorating ideas:

• Simple: Just before serving, dust the top of your tart with confectioner's sugar.
• Extra lemony: Thinly slice a lemon, and cut slices in half. Line the edge of the tart with the lemon halves, with the wide side facing the crust.
• Berrylicious!: Cover the top of the tart with berries - any combination of raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, etc. I decorated mine with sliced kiwi, blueberries, and blackberries.

Kristen - Contributing Writer from Decorate This!

Kristen is a software engineer who dreams about starting her own creative business (a cakery actually). She has always loved to bake and create, and gets great satisfaction from making beautiful things.