Store-bought lemon curd doesn’t even deserve to share the same name as homemade. This from-scratch lemon curd is deliciously tangy, creamy, and sweet. You only need 5 ingredients and it comes together on the stove in 10 minutes! Lemon curd is perfect for scones, crepes, angel food cake, quick breads, pound cake, and so much more.
Let’s talk lemon.
- Are lemon bars your main squeeze?
- Is lemon blueberry cake your favorite dessert?
- Are you head-over-heels for lemon meringue pie?
If your answer is YES to all of the above, you’re going to flip for this creamy, dense, intensely flavorful spread. Homemade lemon curd is 1 million times tastier than store-bought, which is filled with ingredients we can’t pronounce and has likely been sitting on the shelf for too long. Spread the blissful homemade version on scones, biscuits, homemade English muffins, and so much more. This is the recipe you never realized you needed!
What Is Lemon Curd?
Lemon curd is a very rich dessert topping or spread. It’s buttery and sweet with intense tart lemon flavor—like a creamy lemon version of jam. Lemon curd is made from simple ingredients and comes together quickly on the stove. Lemon lovers, this is your jam.
Get it? Get it? 🙂
How to Make Lemon Curd
Here’s how we make DIY lemon curd. The full recipe and instructions are below.
You need 5 ingredients for lemon curd recipe: egg yolks, fresh lemons, sugar, salt, and butter. Each ingredient serves a critical purpose for thickening and flavoring. The egg yolks thicken the curd, just as they do in creme brûlée or butterscotch pudding. Use real lemons; you need both the zest and juice. The sugar supplies sweetness and structure, while the salt balances out the flavor. Add the butter after the curd finishes on the stove. Butter makes it super creamy.
Make lemon curd on the stove. Make sure you are constantly whisking as the mixture thickens—we’re talking about 10 minutes of whisking. The good news? That’s the only step in this recipe: whisking!
Use a Double Boiler
I strongly recommend cooking the lemon curd in a double boiler because mixing these ingredients over direct heat quickly leads to burning. Don’t fret! If you don’t have a double boiler, craft a makeshift double boiler by placing a heatproof glass bowl on top of a larger pot. (You can see my DIY double boiler in my brownie baked Alaska post!) Make sure the bottom of the top pot or bowl does not touch the simmering water. It’s worth repeating: lemon curd should never be cooked on direct heat.
Why Does My Lemon Curd Taste Metallic?
Lemon curd may have a metallic aftertaste if you cook it in a metal double boiler. It’s a result of the eggs and lemon reacting with the pan, but is easily avoidable! Use a non-metal double boiler (this one has a porcelain insert) or the glass bowl option I mention above (but make sure it’s heatproof glass, like Pyrex). While you’re at it, use a silicone whisk too!
Uses for Lemon Curd
There are so many ways to enjoy lemon curd. Here are a few suggestions:
- Enjoy on scones, muffins, buttermilk waffles, or whole wheat blueberry pancakes
- Use as a filling for crepes, lemon cupcakes, or lemon coconut cake
- Use as a topping for pound cake or pavlova (uses the egg whites!)
- Fill French macarons, choux pastry, or layer on strawberry shortcake
- Make a lemon berry trifle
- Spread on English muffins, homemade biscuits, toast, croissants
- Mix it with whipped frosting for the fluffiest filling in a citrus cake
- Top your classic cheesecake, lemon cheesecake, or easy cheesecake pie
- Stir in yogurt, cottage cheese, or spoon on ice cream
- Try it on gingerbread waffles (seriously, try this!)
- Use as a filling to add extra flavor to lemon blueberry cupcakes
- Fill your lemon thumbprint cookies
Lemon Curd
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes (includes cooling)
- Yield: 1 – 1.5 cups
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
You only need 5 simple ingredients for homemade lemon curd—and the recipe comes together on the stove in 10 minutes! If you know how to whisk, you can make this delicious spread.
Ingredients
- 4 large egg yolks (for thicker lemon curd, see Note on eggs)
- 2/3 cup (134g) granulated sugar
- 1 Tablespoon lemon zest (about 1 lemon)
- 1/3 cup (80ml) fresh lemon juice (about 2–3 lemons)
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 6 Tablespoons (86g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature and cut into 6 pieces
Instructions
- Fill the bottom pot of your double boiler with 1–2 inches of water. (Or use the DIY double boiler method listed in the notes.) Place on high heat. Once the water begins to boil, reduce to low heat to keep the water at a simmer.
- Place egg yolks, granulated sugar, lemon zest, lemon juice, and salt into the top pot of your double boiler. Using a silicone whisk, whisk until completely blended, then continue to whisk as the curd cooks. Constant whisking prevents the egg yolks from curdling. Whisk and cook until the mixture becomes thick, resembling the texture of hollandaise sauce, about 10 minutes. If curd isn’t thickening, turn up the heat and constantly whisk.
- Remove pan from heat. Whisk the sliced butter into the curd. The butter will melt from the heat of the curd as you whisk. Pour curd into a jar or bowl and place a piece of plastic wrap directly on top so it is touching the top of the curd. (This prevents a skin from forming on top.) The curd will continue to thicken as it cools. Once cool, the plastic wrap can be removed.
- Refrigerate the curd for up to about 10 days.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: For longer storage, you can freeze the curd up to 3–6 months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight before enjoying.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Egg Separator | Citrus Juicer | Citrus Zester | Non-Metal Double Boiler | Silicone Whisk
- Thicker Lemon Curd: For thicker lemon curd, replace 2 of the egg yolks with 1 whole egg. This means you will use 2 egg yolks plus 1 whole egg. Keep the rest of the recipe and instructions the same.
- Lemon Juice: Do not use bottled lemon juice. Use fresh-squeezed lemon juice.
- Butter: You can use salted butter instead of unsalted butter. Simply omit 1/8 teaspoon salt in the recipe.
- No Double Boiler? No Problem! If you do not own a double boiler, you can simply place a small heatproof glass bowl over a saucepan of simmering water—you will cook the curd in the top pot/bowl.
- No Straining: I don’t strain the lemon curd. The zest is very tiny and has been cooked, so you can hardly detect its texture. It’s really just there for flavor. However, feel free to run the finished lemon curd through a fine mesh sieve if you want to take the extra step.
Can I substitute raspberries for the lemons or would the ratios be off?
Hi Edain, We haven’t tested a raspberry curd but let us know if you try it!
Hi there! Great recipe and incredible taste! If the curd turns out to be too runny, even after cooling in the fridge, what do you recommend to thicken it up after the fact?
Hi Anna, I’m glad to read that you enjoyed this lemon curd. To make it thicker after it’s been prepared, you could always place the curd back in a double boiler over low heat and whisk in 1/2 teaspoon of cornstarch. Keep whisking over heat until it begins to thicken.
Emphasis on the heart-proof bowl – my 1st attempt ended in a sudden crack of glass! Second attempt was very good!
Second time I’ve made this..gave too much away so must make more! Made 2 batches this time. I confess to an error — when doubling the amounts, I added the amount of lemon juice instead of the sugar….I did increase the amount of sugar, then, by another 1/3 cup. Took a while for it to thicken, and it is cooling now. So, I don’t know yet about the consistency, but it tastes amazing!
This recipe is amazing! I do whisk it for a long time to get it a little thicker. I haven’t tried replacing 2 of the yolks with one egg yet. I’m wondering if anyone has reduced or replaced the sugar with something else to bring the sugar content down? I’m considering monkfruit or honey.
Happy New Year Sally!
Can I double or triple this recipe? I want to make at least 4-6 batches and was wondering if I had to do one batch at a time?
Thank you,
Hi Janet, Yes, you can make double batches of this lemon curd. Enjoy!
Do you thicken this recipe for macarons?
If using this as a filling for macarons, I don’t thicken it but I do recommend waiting for it to completely cool then refrigerating it. It thickens as it cools.
Awesome as usual! Sally’s recipes are perfectly sweet without being overbearing or losing the integrity of the recipe. I’d definitely recommend this recipe 🙂
Just gave jars of this amazing recipe to my co-workers, labeling it “Holiday Sunshine Lemon Curd,” then sent them all an email with the link to this page and Dorie Greenspan’s lemon meringue cookie recipe because this curd is so bomb spread on her shortbread cookies warm from the oven. Your recipe is so easy to make, and tastes like a summer explosion of yum! Thank you, and love your website!
This recipe worked perfectly for me! I have to admit it took more than ten minutes for the curd the thicken up, but that might be because I used raw unrefined sugar instead of white granulated. Thanks for the great recipe!
I have made the lemon curd and now want to make a lemon meringue pie. Can I use this lemon curd for that?
Hi Adrienne, We don’t recommend using this curd in a big tart or pie since it will not slice neatly. You can follow the recipe for Classic Lemon Meringue Pie instead.
Would it be possible to use plant (avocado) butter in place of dairy butter?
Hi Sara, We haven’t tried this recipe with any dairy-free alternatives, but you can certainly give it a try. If you do, please let us know how it goes!
Hi Sally! Would this work between layers of your white cake instead of using buttercream? Thanks!
Hi Haley, Lemon curd is delicious with the white cake! However, the curd is too liquid-y to use by itself, so it’s best to pair it with a thin layer of frosting. You can see an example of how we used it between the layers of this Lemon Coconut Cake.
This recipe is great! Super easy and delicious. Only thing is I still get the metallic taste even with a glass bowl double boiler and a silicone whisk. I stored the curd in a mason jar, do you think the acid could have reacted with the top of the mason jar to get the metallic flavor?
Fantastic and super easy recipe! I make this lemon curd as a filling for my French macarons. This recipe is perfect as written
Easy to make and totally scrumptious.
Thanks, it is a great recipe. I used a plastic bowl to start with instead of a glass bowl, and that didn’t work, transferred it to a glass bowl, and then it thickened nicely. The texture and taste is great, thanks for the recipe!
I just made your lemon curd recipe this morning to top a Dutch baby. This is such a great, simple recipe that turned out delicious! I use so many of your recipes for baking and they’ve all been hits. You’re amazing, thank you
Hi Sally!
I made this to go inside your recipe for Homemade breakfast pastries and it was delish! However my curd took more time to thicken than your recipe. It took at least 7 minutes more to thicken. Any suggestions as to what might have happened? Thanks!
Hi Tiana, It’s normal for times to vary (due to different heat settings, thickness of your bowl, etc.)! If curd isn’t thickening, turn up the heat and constantly whisk.
The recipe sounds delicious. I am planning on making this lemon curd but was wondering if it can be canned in a hot water bath. I would like to make it and give as gifts for Christmas but a 10 day shelf life isn’t long enough. If yes, would you treat it the same way as a preserve or a jelly as far as the cooking time in the canner goes?.
Hi Judy! Many readers have canned this in the same manner you can a jam or jelly. I haven’t personally tested it though.
Hello! I’m planning to use this to fill a three-layer, 8″ cake. Do you think it would be enough, or double it? I’ve never filled a cake with a curd before so not sure. Thanks!
Hi Amanda, this should be plenty to fill a 3 layer 8-inch cake! If you use it on all 3 layers, you’ll have about 1/3-1/2 cup per layer, and if you only use it in between the layers, you’ll have about 1/2-3/4 cup to use. Hope you enjoy it!
I made this lemon Curd, it came out perfect. I made some many times in the past, but this is a treasure find, Thank you Sally.
Fantastic recipe – tart, creamy and delicious!
Who knew such a simple recipe could yield such amazing results! I differed from the instructions a bit and creamed the sugar and butter together first and slowly mixed in the other ingredients. Came out perfect!
Hi Sally – I’ve made this curd before and it was a huge success!
Now, I’m wondering if it’s possible to make something similar, but with blueberries. I know the citrus is the important part to making it curd, but is it possible? Like, cook blueberries for a while, add lemon juice, egg yolks, and sugar and cook over the double boiler, just like you would for the lemon curd. Would it still thicken the same?
Hi Kristen, We are so happy you enjoyed this lemon curd! We haven’t tested a blueberry curd but let us know if you try it!
I made this to add to your lemon blueberry layer cake. I made it last night and tasted it this morning after chilling overnight. It is dangerously delicious. I had to put it away to have enough left for the cake! Thank you so much for your wonderful recipes. Can’t wait to try to the cake!
Hi Sally, I’m planning to but this in your vanilla layer cake(between layers). Any reason this wouldn’t be a good idea?
None at all – it’s delicious between layers of cake! We like to put down a thin layer of buttercream and then this curd between layers 🙂
Lovely curd. I was a little nervous … and skeptical. My previous curd recipe used cornstarch. I’m wondering why some do and some don’t. Also, I noticed huge differences in the amount of butter, some, like the aforementioned cornstarch recipe, only use 1TBS butter, whilst one recipe I tried, same finished amount, used only two eggs, but 11 TBS butter. Why so wildly different?
Sorry if this has been asked already but does this recipe double or triple well? I am thinking about making it for a sweet summertime gift to neighbors. Who couldn’t use a little unexpected love during these times?
This makes a lovely gift, Christine! Yes, you can make double batches of this lemon curd.
I think this is a wonderfully easy recipe if done with care and using the valuable tips given. Lemon curd can be used in so many different ways.