Tastes so Light and Fluffy...
19 February 2008
To complete the “Mediterranean fusion” menu suggested in my last two posts (the balsamic lentils last week and the stuffed pimientos al piquillo the week before) I tried out a lemon cream, as I still had a bunch of those fruits in the kitchen, waiting to be eaten. So, as it seams, a very healthy dessert with a lot of vitamins. As long as you don’t mention that its light and fluffy texture stems from the whipped egg yolks…So let’s just forget about this minor detail – and desserts go into a different stomach anyway, don’t they?
I have eaten this kind of lemon cream a lot of times in restaurants in Spain, but I’ve never really had a recipe for it. So this one is just based on my own imagination of how it could work. After mixing the lemon juice with some whipped egg yolks and sugar I found the cream still far to sour, so I added some crème fraîche to take away the acidity. I suppose the original would probably have suggested some form of milk instead, so this is just my individual version!
Crema al Limón
| serves 4 |
| 4 eggs yolks |
| 3 lemons (juice and zest) |
| 2 bottle cups of cointreau |
| 100ml crème fraîche |
| 1 1/2 teaspoons of corn starch |
| 8-10 tablespoons of icing sugar |
| 2 packages of vanilla sugar |
| 1 cinnamon stick |
| some cinnamon powder |
Grate the zest of the 3 lemons into a bowl and keep it prepared. Squeeze the peeled lemons and heat the juice together with the vanilla sugar, 2 bottle cups full of cointreau as well as the whole cinnamon stick and let it simmer for at least 20 minutes, so the cinnamon stick can leave enough aroma in the juice.
Just before the juice mixture is fully done with cooking, whip the egg yolks with about half of the icing sugar and the grated lemon zest, ideally over steam, until very foamy. To be most efficient, just hold the bowl over the steaming juice while whipping.
Remove the cinnamon stick from the juice mixture. Dissolve the corn starch in a little bit of water, make sure there are no lumps, and add it to the simmering juice. Keep stirring until the sauce has thickened, then take it off the heat. Once the juice is not boiling any more and just about cool enough not to burn your mouth, stir in the foamy egg yolks and keep whisking strongly right until the mixture has cooled down (or is at least no warmer than lukewarm). If you stir well, the egg should not clot! Season to your taste with the remaining sugar.
Fill the cream into suitable dishes and store them in the fridge. Just before serving, decorate each one with a pinch of cinnamon powder.