lemon curd

the terrible associative power of the human mind means that if you're trying to diet, you can't read a book about food because you will be compelled to get off the couch and eat, not of your own volition, and there's nothing you can do about it (apparently some people have willpower, I'm not sure how this works...) so I was listening to Alain de Botton talk about his house to someone from the BBC whom he'd let in there for a bit of a tour, and he started talking about the picture of lemons he has hanging on his wall. it's nice to have a picture of lemons, he said, because it changes your mood as it reminds you of the beauty in the everyday, and if you have it in your house it reminds you that there is beauty and dignity in the everydayness of home and family life. I have to say I like his slightly precious philosophies on the way our environments affect us emotionally, and I could certainly get all squishy inside about lemons as a symbolic feature of home if I wasn't so busy thinking about eating lemon curd.

I have a staple lemon curd recipe which has no cream, and isn't as rich as the egg yolk only types, and I it favour because (I know it's only lemon curd, not bloody philosophy) I prefer not to separate eggs unless the albumen and yolk will be reunited in the end in a cosmic expression of fecundity and completeness (don't worry, I'm not a creationist or anything, quite the opposite). think about it, lots of dishes are designed around this perspective, like oeufs à la neige or almond bread and zabaglione, or JG's scheme to get pavlova for dessert by making pasta carbonara for dinner (ok, not quite, but it fits with my egg cosmology!).

Stephanie Alexander has an interesting note in The Cook's Companion about the rather counter-intuitive fact of the lemon juice acidty mitigating the risk of the fats splitting during cooking, which means go ahead and heat without fear, it'll probably work out (or at least be slightly less afraid than for making custard...)


whole egg lemon curd

zest and juice of 4 lemons

2 large eggs

150g caster sugar

100g butter

3 teaspoons pure cornflour (or more if you want the curd to set firm when chilled)

method
this is totally no fuss: put everything into the one saucepan (you could beat the eggs a bit before adding the other stuff if you wanted) and start to heat it slowly over direct heat, stirring to melt the butter and sugar.

once everything is smooth use medium heat and just keep stirring until it thickens (about 7-8 minutes).

turn the heat down and stir for another minute or two to ensure smoothness.

it's best to put the saucepan into a sink of cold water at this point to avoid a cooked-egg flavour, but keep stirring to prevent splitting (this doesn't need to take long, just enough to bring it down from the high cooking temperature).

it'll firm up when chilled (if there's any left to chill...) and can be used as a filling for pastries, especially with a little extra cornflour.