You will notice the recent trend in lemon recipes here.
You see, my wonderful mother-in-law brought me a whole shopping bag full of home-grown Meyer lemons when she arrived for Thanksgiving.
Besides the Lemon Pecan Tart, Lemon Bars, and Lemonata Vinaigrette, I have been juicing and freezing lemon juice by the ice cube tray full.
I will never have to by lemons again for any recipe that calls for juice. Just FYI, typically recipes that call for the “juice of one lemon” will require about 2 tablespoons of juice.
That being said, these are mambo-jambo lemons and I can get almost 8 oz. from one of the behemoth beauties.
Here is a gift idea for the upcoming holidays, or a seasoning for the Season.
Lemon Pepper Seasoning
Zest of 4-5 large lemons
1/3 c. peppercorns (I used a medley blend.)
1/4 c. coarse sea saltUsing a microplane, zest the lemons.
Place peppercorns in blender or spice grinder and grind to a coarse consistency.
(You don’t want powder and a few whole peppercorns are okay.)
Mix all ingredients and spread on parchment paper. Place in a food dryer or in a convection oven on “dehydrate” setting for an hour or two, stirring occasionally to get rid of any “clumps” of zest. After a couple of hours, I turned my oven off and let it set overnight to ensure it was completely dry.
After the zest in the mixture is dried, you can return the entire mixture to a spice grinder and grind to desired texture. Store in airtight container.
My inspiration for this came from Simply Scratch. I modified the instructions just a bit. I have yet to try this on chicken or fish, but I am packaging some up for gifts.
This is basically my only “gift” post this month (with the exception of Handcrafted Baileys Irish Cream. I cheated a bit and compiled my old December posts together in Gift Ideas if you need more inspiration.
Hope your gift buying or making is on schedule. Only four days left!