My mother has a recipe for the cassoulet in the world. I mean, technically it’s not a cassoulet because there is no sausage or duck confit, but it has lamb shanks and a whole lot of flageolet beans, so it’s close enough. Also, it tastes heavenly. 

The reason it tastes so amazing begins with the flageolet beans which are, according to the package, “the caviar of beans.” They’re so delicious and soft and absorb all of the amazing juices that come out of the lamb shanks better than any other bean I’ve ever had. 

But this is not a recipe for that cassoulet. That may come in the future. Instead, this is an ode to an amazing lemon tart, curtsey of David Lebovitz that is the perfect pairing for any heavy rich meal. 

I tend to dislike lemon-based desserts because I find that they’re always too sweet in an attempt to mitigate the lemon flavor, when, in my mind, that sour lemon flavor is the whole point. Of course I don’t think it should be unpleasant, or even cause that tingling in your jaw that sour things do, but biting into something “lemon” and having it taste sickly sweet is extremely unappealing. So I made it my mission to make a lemon tart that had the perfect balance of sweet and sour. 

This was my first attempt at a custard tart, but I had made creme brûlée so I wasn’t too worried. I just had to remember to temper my egg yokes. I followed this recipe almost exactly, except that I cut down on the sugar a little bit and added a bit more lemon juice and zest to achieve that perfect lemon tartness. I also followed his suggested tart shell recipe, but I realized too late that my tart pan was a little bit bigger than that used in the recipe, so I really had to make that dough stretch. I would suggest making one and a half batches, because even if your pan is a bit smaller, extra tart dough is always a good thing. 

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My favorite thing about this recipe was how easy it was. It took maybe an hour, and at no point did I feel particularly stressed. The only point of concern was when I was waiting for the custard to thicken which took a little longer than I expected, but it came around in the end. David Lebovitz suggests leaving the tart plain on top, but I can’t leave well enough alone, so I thought that some raspberries would add another dimension of tartness. (I realized later that I put them on because subconsciously I was trying to create a lemon tart I had in Dublin two years ago.) The sage leaf in the middle was just a little greenery in bleak, bleak February.