Second Place (categories)

LAYERED WONDERS

This Christmasy version of lemon bars, with a gingerbread crust and topping with crystallized ginger, may also have you thinking lemon meringue pie. Terese Jackson of New Berlin is its creator.

Gingerbread Lemon Cups Makes 5 to 5 1⁄2 dozen

Cookie dough:

3⁄4 cup (1 1⁄2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

3⁄4 cup packed brown sugar

1⁄4 cup granulated sugar

1 egg

1⁄2 cup molasses

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

2 3⁄4 cups flour

2 1⁄2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 1⁄2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1⁄2 teaspoon ground allspice

1⁄2 teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon baking soda

Lemon filling:

6 tablespoons flour

4 tablespoons cornstarch

1 1⁄2 cups granulated

sugar

1⁄4 teaspoon salt

2 cups water

6 egg yolks

4 teaspoons lemon zest

1 cup lemon juice

1⁄4 cup (1⁄2 stick) butter

1⁄2 cup flour

3 tablespoons butter, melted

3 tablespoons sugar

1⁄2 teaspoon lemon zest

2 teaspoons finely diced crystallized ginger

Melted butter for greasing muffin pan

Candied lemon peel for decoration:

2 cups water (divided)

1 1⁄2 cups sugar (divided)

Thin strips of lemon peel (yellow part only, removed with a vegetable peeler)

In a bowl, cream butter with sugars until light and fluffy. Mix in egg until incorporated, then blend in molasses, vanilla, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk flour with spices and baking soda. Add flour mixture slowly to butter mixture until fully combined. Refrigerate dough 2 hours.

Make lemon filling: Beat egg yolks in a small bowl. In a medium saucepan, mix flour, cornstarch, sugar, salt and water. Whisk constantly over medium heat until it thickens and bubbles. Mixture will be quite thick. Remove pan from heat. Pour about one-third of the hot liquid into bowl with egg yolks and whisk quickly to combine. Then pour egg yolk mixture back into saucepan with rest of the hot liquid. Add lemon juice and zest and return pan to medium heat; whisk 3 to 4 minutes until mixture is thick and smooth. Remove from heat and stir in butter. Make crumb topping: Mix all ingredients into a sandy,

crumb texture. Make cookies: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Prepare mini muffin pans by lightly brushing insides of wells with melted butter.

Scoop chilled dough using a small (1 teaspoon) cookie scoop. Roll dough into a ball and press one ball into each muffin tin opening so it covers the bottom and sides. (Flouring your fingers will make it easier to press in the dough.) Fill each shell with a heaping teaspoon of the lemon filling (filling should mound slightly above top of cookie shell). Top each with 1⁄2 teaspoon or so of the crumb topping.

Bake in preheated oven 15 to 19 minutes, rotating pans halfway through cooking time, until cookie cup is set and crumble topping is golden.

Remove pans from oven and let cookies cool in pans 5 minutes or so before removing to a cooling rack.

Combine peel and 1 cup water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and simmer 15 minutes. Drain, discarding water and remove peel. Bring remaining 1 cup water and 1 cup sugar to a simmer in same saucepan. Add peel and simmer 15 minutes. Drain peel again (reserve the lemony syrup for another purpose like moistening a layer cake before icing or adding it to a cocktail). Add the sticky peel to remaining 1⁄2 cup sugar and toss until well-coated.

Garnish top of each cookie cup with a strip of peel.

Temperature and time are based on using light-colored (not dark) muffin pans.

Mix dough: