Margarita Bars

Hello Summer!

Here on the east coast, it seems that someone turned on the blast furnace just in time for labor day weekend. And forgot to turn it off again. Not even the shore was immune, as I found out during my very hot 5 Miler!

Three 95+ degree days in a row does not leave me excited at the prospect of baking. I think I’m breaking into a sweat just at the idea of turning my oven on. But there are some summertime treats so cool and refreshing, that the end result is worth the initial heat investment.

Take these Margarita Bars. I made them for a lovely clam bake we attended on the beautiful Indian River Bay this past weekend. I had to turn on the oven in our already hot beach house kitchen to make them. But the cool satisfaction of biting into a lemon bar’s hipper adult cousin while trying to beat the summer heat–makes summer living easy.

Margarita Bars
Adapted from Sugarcrafter

I knew I HAD to make these as soon as they popped up in my feed over the weekend. And the recipe to conversion time was shockingly fast–I think we were eating these less than 10 hours after I saw the recipe! I did make a few alterations–I doubled the recipe (the recipe below will fit in a 13 x 9 pan) and I used margarita mix instead of tequila and triple sec because that’s what we had. And when you need dessert NOW, you have to work with what you have! Next time I will make these will the full strength alcohol. Also, we found these had a stronger taste after an overnight in the fridge, so I would recommend baking the day before you plan to serve.

Ingredients:

For the crust:
2 cups flour
1 cup powdered sugar
2 tsp salt
1 cup butter, melted

For the filling:
4 eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups granulated sugar
4 Tbsp flour
1/2 tsp salt
4 Tbsp tequila
2 Tbsp triple sec
4 Tbsp fresh lime juice
4 tsp lime zest
1 drop green food coloring (optional)
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease an 13 x 9 baking dish. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, powdered sugar, and salt. Stir in the melted butter. Press the dough into the baking dish (try to get it even) and then bake 15-20 minutes or until the edges of the crust turn light brown.

Reduce the heat to 300 degrees. In another medium bowl, mix together the eggs, sugar, flour, salt, tequila, triple sec, and lime juice and zest, and food coloring. Pour the filling mixture over the warm crust and bake another 25-30 minutes, or until center is set.

After removing the dish from the oven, lightly dust with powdered sugar. Let cool, refrigerate and then cut into squares. Store leftovers in the refrigerator.

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