Melissa's Lemon Bars made with oatmeal and...

We cut these to look like Lemon Quadrilaterals or Lemon Parallelograms and not like traditional lemon squares or lemon bars
  
This lemon bar recipe uses oatmeal and sweetened condensed milk.  I don't know what cookbook they are from except that the original recipe was called Florida Lemon Bars and the chef author was a friend of chef Craig Claiborne.  One of our kids adapted this recipe for the County Fair and won 2nd place in 2003!  A few years later, our other kid changed the recipe and added some to the recipe and won 1st place!

Lemon parallelograms made with oatmeal

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. double-acting baking powder
1/2 teaspoon satl
1 14 or 15 oz. can of sweetened condensed milk

finely grated rind of 1 or 2 lemons
1/2 cup lemon juice
5 1/3 (10 2/3 Tbsp.) butter
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 cup old-fashioned or quick-cooking oatmeal

Preheat over to 350 degrees.  Butter a 9 x 13 inch pan.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt and set aside.  Pour the condensed milk into a medium-sized bowl.  Add the grated lemon rind and then, gradually add the lemon juice, stirring with a small whisk to keep the mixture smooth. The lemon with thicken the milk.  The juice curdles the milk; reacts with the proteins in the milk making them stick together.  Set the mixture aside.

In a large bowl, cream the butter with an electric mixer.  Add the sugar and beat well.  On the lowest speed gradually add the sifted dry ingredients, scraping the bowl with a rubber spatula and beating only until thoroughly mixed.  Mix in the oatmeal.  The mixture will be crumbly and will not hold together.

Sprinkle a little more than half of the oatmeal mixture evenly over the bottom of the prepared pan.  Pat the crumbs firmly with your fingertips to make a smooth, compact layer.  Drizzle or spoon the lemon mixture evenly over the crumb layer and spread it to make a thin, smooth layer.  Sprinkle the remaining crumbly oatmeal mixture evenly over the lemon layer.  Pat the crumbs gently with the palm of your hand to smooth them---it is okay if the lemon layer shows through.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes until the cake is lightly browned.

Cook completely in the pan.  Then refrigerate for about an hour before cutting on the diagonal one way and horizontal or vertical the other way.  Decorate with raspberries for an award winning taste and color.



Lemon Quadrilaterals baked in the microwave
Joe found this lemon bar recipe that are baked in the microwave (!) and they taste great.

Base:
1 cup flour
2 Tbsp powdered sugar
1 Tbsp lemon zest
1/2 cup butter

Filling:
1 cup sugar
1 Tbsp lemon zest
3 eggs
1 Tbsp flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup lemon juice

Grease a 9 x 9 microwavable pan.

To make the base:  mix the flour, powdered sugar and lemon zest.  Melt the butter and combine with the flour mixture.  The mixture will be crumbly.  Pat it into the greased pan. Microwave for 3 minutes at power level 8 until the base is firm.  Depending on the strength of your microwave, it may need an additional minute.

To make the filling:  combine the sugar, lemon zest, eggs, flour, baking powder, salt and lemon juice in a medium-size bowl.  Beat for 2 minutes.  Pour over base.  Return to microwave and cook at power level 8 for 3 minutes until the filling is set but has a slight wiggle like Jello-O.   Depending on the strength of your microwave, it may need another minute. Cool completely.  Refrigerate a minimum of 4 hours.  You can cut into squares but I like to cut bar cookies into quadrilaterals (baklava is traditionally cut into this shape)  Cut one side completely diagonally and then cut the other side perpendicular to the pan edge to make the quadrilateral shape.  Keep these in a refrigerator or cooler because the filling contains eggs.