Gluten-free Lemon Bars

I made these yesterday for a large group of children coming to my house after school. They were very good. I usually make Sarah's recipe, which I still love, but this one caught my eye. It is based off a recipe from Martha Stewart and the top is soft and yummy. I thought it needed more lemon flavor, but one of the girls thought it was sour enough. Lemon bar crust can be tricky to make gf because it can easily fall apart when you pour the lemon-egg mixture on it. I am not always successful in preventing this, but if I cook the crust longer than the original recipe states, and add xanthan gum and some sticky starch like tapioca or glutinous rice flour, I usually can get by. We will eat it even if the lemon filling gets all mixed up with the crust anyway. This is the doubled recipe; the original recipe called for a 9-inch square pan, which was not going to be enough for 11 hungry children. You can easily halve this if you are more moderate in your consumption.

Crust:

1 3/4  cups gf flour 

1/4  cup glutinous rice flour

1/2  teaspoon xanthan gum

1/3  cup sugar

a little salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 sticks cold butter, cut into pieces

Lemon Goodness:

8 eggs (I know this is a lot, but go for it)

2 cups sugar

1 1/3 to 1 1/2 cup lemon juice (I would also add zest and maybe a few drops of lemon oil, but I am somewhat of a lemon fanatic)

1/2 cup  glutinous rice flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Heat oven to 350 degrees and prepare a large pyrex pan (11x15, but 9x13 would most likely be fine). You can prepare by just pulling it out and setting it on the counter, or you can line with parchment paper.

In a bowl, mix flours, sugar, salt, and baking powder. With your hands, or two knives like Laura Eileen is so good at, or a pastry cutter cut in the butter until the butter is pea sized or so. Pat this into the bottom of the pyrex and bake for 25 minutes, or until it looks mostly dry. Take it out and let it sit for a minute. Lower the temperature to 325 degrees.

While this is baking, vigorously whisk the eggs until thickened (or if you are like Sarah, use a mixer). Whisk in sugar, lemon juice, glutinous rice flour, and salt. I like to add the baking powder just before I put it in the oven for some unsupported reason.

Gently pour the lemon-egg mixture on the pastry and return to the oven for another 20 minutes. The lemon top will be set, but not browned after these 20 minutes. Let cool and then refrigerate for a while, or just eat it, I suppose, but I refrigerated it while I waited for the kids to come.

Note: Don't burn yourself while putting the pan in and taking it out of the oven again. It hurts.