Like a Cheesecake Without the Cheese: Lemon Oat Bars

One of my favorite recipes so far from 100 Cookies is Sarah Kieffer's Strawberry Crème Fraîche Bars, which have a creamy strawberry-condensed milk filling sandwiched between a crust and crumble made from the same oat (or almond flour) mixture. The cookbook includes two other recipes that are quite similar, in that they both have a mixture doing double duty as the crust and crumble, and fillings made with condensed milk. I haven't tried the chocolate-hazelnut version yet, but I have tried the lemon version, which are Kieffer's "Lemon Oat Bars."
 
The mixture that forms the crust and crumble is almost identical to that in the strawberry crème fraîche bars, except that it contains 30 grams less rolled oats. You make it by combining all of the dry ingredients (flour, oats, brown sugar, granulated sugar, baking soda, and salt); and mixing in room temperature butter until the mixture is crumbly. You press half of the mixture into a parchment-lined 9-inch by 13-inch pan and parbake it. Then you spread on the lemon filling (a mixture of sweetened condensed milk, lemon juice, heavy cream, lemon zest, vanilla, and salt); sprinkle on the remaining crust mixture; and bake until the filling is set. You cool the bars and chill them for a few hours before slicing and serving.
The lemon filling was nicely set and kept its shape after I cut the bars. These bars were rich and delicious, but I preferred the strawberry version. While the strawberry filling reminded me a lot of strawberry ice cream, the lemon version was quite reminiscent of cheesecake, notwithstanding the fact that it doesn't include any cream cheese. It was very dense and creamy, which are good qualities -- but it just seemed a bit heavy to me. I think I would have preferred something a bit more sharp, like lemon curd. But don't get me wrong, these bars were terrific. They had a nice variety of textures with the firm and substantial bottom crust and the crunchy crumble topping. And they are decadent -- a little goes a long way!
 
Recipe: "Lemon Oat Bars" from 100 Cookies by Sarah Kieffer. 

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