Lime curd

Delicious homemade curd made with fresh limes. Perfect on toast, as a tart or cake fillings or drizzles over your favourite pudding.

It makes a nice change to the traditional lemon curd and since you can’t readily buy it in the regular shop, it makes it pretty special too.

Why make this recipe?

• Suprisingly easy to make (and quicker to make than a lime marmalade recipe)
• Very zingy taste
• Great as a gift for your family and friends

What exactly is lime curd and how to use it

Lime curd is a variation on lemon curd. It has nothing to do with cheese or curd, but it’s made with fresh fruit, sugar, butter and eggs. It’s a sort of sweet condiment or preserve, which can be used in the same way as marmalades or jams for toast, croissaints or bread rolls in the morning.

You can also use lime curd as a filling for various fruit tarts and for baking. One of my favourite ways of using lime or lemon curd is to make a zingy chocolate truffle ganache. I usually use white chocolate and instead of cream I use lime or lemon curd to make the ganache. The flavour is amazing especially if you add few extra drops of real lime juice, tiny pinch of salt and tiny pinch of ground white pepper.

My top tips on making lime curd recipe successfully first time round

Don’t rush the stirring and thickening of the lime curd. It will happen eventually, but you don’t want to end up with scrambled eggs.

Use caster sugar for a smooth texture

The question of using whole eggs versus egg yolks in fruit curds

Over the years, I’ve made quite a few batches of different fruit curds with whole eggs and with egg yolks only and there are benefits of both methods.

Whole eggs lime curd method

• No wastage – use whole eggs for the recipe
• Could taste a bit ‘eggy’ and rubbery (because of the egg white)
• Easy to get scrambled when you overheat the mixture
• Some people are alergic to egg whites

Egg yolks lime curd method

• More creamy & smooth texture, flavour and finish
• Less prone to curdling when heated up

If you see any recipe with whole eggs and you want to replace them with just egg yolks, you should double the amount of eggs. Leftover egg whites are perfect for making simple omelettes, traditional yeasted pancakes or making meringues.

What makes this recipe work

The combination of zingy limes works great with the smooth buttery flavour of the curd.

Any specialist equipment needed?

• Medium size saucepan
• bowl (glass or stainless steel) to fit inside/above your saucepan
• 2 medium sized jam jars

Pro tip

Make sure that you heat the lime curd mixture over very low heat and that your mixing bowl doesn’t touch the water. Keep checking the level of water too to ensure that you have enough under your bowl.

Stir your lime curd mixture steadily, but don’t go crazy with it. If you stir it too much over a very hot heat, you’ll end up with scrambled eggs!

If you want to get even smoother and thicker lime curd use 4 egg yolks instead of the 2 eggs. This will help to emulsify the mixture more, makes a smoother texture and also help with making the flavour richer.

Ingredients & Possible Substitutions

Limes

Make sure you use organic and not treated limes, because we will be using the fruit’s rind.

Butter

Unsalted butter is best for this recipe, but you can use a part salted and part unsalted butter as well. Make sure that if you use salted butter you don’t add more salt to the recipe.

For the traditional lime curd recipe, I use regular dairy butter.

Sugar

Caster sugar is best for this recipe because it dissolves quicker (the sugar crystals are small). You can also use granulated white sugar.

I wouldn’t recommend using any brown or dark sugars, coconut sugar or it’s alternatives as it would change the flavour of the lime curd too much and the sugar would also spoil the colour.

Saying that you can actually use honey or agave syrup with this recipe. Just swap the same amount of honey or agave syrup for the caster sugar. You will achieve a slightly mellow, sweeter taste and the honey or agave syrup will come through really nicely. Again, I wouldn’t use any darker natural sugar syrups (like date, maple or carob syrups) because the flavour and colour would suffer.

Eggs

The fresher eggs you use the better because they will emulsify (cream in) better. It’s your call if you use whole eggs or egg yolks, there are some advantages and disadvantages to both methods (see my notes above).

I usually use medium to large size eggs, but over the years I probably used mixed sizes too. It’s just a matter of simmering the curd for bit longer if you need to towards the end of the cooking process if the mixture is too liquidy.

Salt

Salt is totally optional, but I think it helps to balance out the flavours and makes the zingy lime flavour pop even more.

The method – How to make lime curd

Wash the limes and dry them first.

Grate the rind to get as much lime grind as possible, but avoid grating the white pith under the green skin.

Juice all the limes and pour the juice through a fine mesh sieve to get rid of any pith, pips or large pulp.

Add about 1 inch or 2 cm of water to a medium size saucepan and bring to a gentle simmer over a low to medium heat on your hob.

In a suitable bowl (stainless steel, plastic or pottery) mix the butter. sugar, lime rind and lime juice with a large pinch of salt.

Place the bowl over the saucepan and let the lemon curd mixture dissolve. Stir gently to make sure all ingredients are incorporated and the sugar has dissolved properly (check on the back of a clean spoon for any sugar crystals).

In the meanwhile, beat the eggs together (using both yolk and egg white or 4 egg yolks if you have a leftover from another recipe).

Strain the eggs through a fine mesh sieve to get rid of any impurities.

Once everything has dissolved, add the eggs to the main mixture.

Carry on stirring the lime curd mixture, ensuring that the heat is very low and that the water doesn’t boil (only simmers).

Stir gently for another 20 minutes or until the mixture thickens and becomes lovely and creamy.

To achieve a smooth lime curd, pour and press the hot mixture through a fine sieve (and discard any lime zest).

Pour carefully into prepared glasses or other suitable containers.

Keep in a refrigerator and use within 1-2 months maximum.

How else you can make this recipe?

• Lime & Gin Curd – add 2 tablespoons of gin right at the end of the cooking process
• Lime & Honey Curd – swap the sugar for honey and follow the recipe as it is

Allergies, dietary requirements

This recipe contains eggs and although we have cooked them, this recipe might not be suitable for anyone who is avoiding fresh (raw) eggs.

This recipe is not suitable for vegan diets and it’s not dairy free as it contains butter.

• Gluten free

Lime curd will be perfect with these recipes

• Homemade white bread (no knead) >>
• Light & Fluffy Pancakes (made with yeast) >>
• Crusty sourdough bread >>

Batch Size

This recipe makes 2 medium sized jam jars or similar size glass jars. I purposely made this recipe on a smaller size because curds have a shorter shelf life and unless you want to give some away, they are not going to last very long.

I scale up or down this recipe?

Technically you could scale down this recipe by halving all the ingredients, but since this recipe makes only 2 jam jars, I think it’s pretty budget-friendly already.

If you fancy making more of this delicious lime curd, you can easily double the quantity of the ingredients in the recipe and make more!

You have to make sure that you get a large saucepan and larger mixing bowl. The simmering time might not be much longer than the standard recipe as the saucepan/bowl/heat will increase with the recipe. Saying that, the timings can vary once you start adjusting the ingredients ratio.

How to store lime curd

Store in an airtight container (jam jar or similar) in the fridge for up to 3-4 weeks (or up to 1-2 months if alcohol is added). Once opened, eat within 7-10 days, but keep an eye on it just in case it goes off sooner.

You can also freeze lime curd by cooling it down completely and then placing it into a strong freezer bag (that can expand if needed). You can keep the lime curd frozen for 1-3 months, then defrost it and use it straight away (whilst storing it in the fridge).

Lime curd shelf life

1-2 months unopened in the fridge

7-10 days once opened

1-3 months frozen

1-2 months unopened in the fridge (with alcohol)

Why not stay in touch…

I hope you enjoy making this recipe and if you do, I’d love to know what you think! Let me know in the comments below or find me on Instagram or Facebook and add the hashtag #cocoaandheart so that I can see your post.

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Magdalena