Magic Lemon Ice Box Cake

No holiday or celebration should pass without a culinary delicacy involved.  I am sure many of you observed our past national holiday, National Clean Out Your Fridge Day, but wanted to do even more then rinsing out your Hydro-matic crisper bins.

I like the idea of involving the newly tidy fridge as part of the celebratory creation.

One option is to toss all of those leftovers into a lovely molded jello salad, if you happen to have substantial quantities of Veg-All and tuna lingering behind.  Not all of us are that lucky though.  Another idea is to make a refrigerator freezer dessert!  Something like:

Magic Lemon Ice Box Cake

1 cup finely crushed chocolate cookie crumbs

2 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp butter, melted

2 eggs, separated

1 (15 oz) can Eagle Brand Sweetened Condensed Milk

1 tablespoon grated lemon rind

1/2 cup Sunkist fresh lemon juice

1/4 tsp almond extract

Combine crumbs, 2 tbsp of the sugar, and  butter.  

Press 1 cup mixture on bottom and sides of a buttered refrigerator tray; chill.

Reserve remaining crumbs for top.

Beat egg yolks until thick; add Eagle Brand.  Add rind, juice, almond extract; stir until thick.

Beat egg whites; gradually add remaining sugar and beat until stiff.

  Fold into Eagle Brand and lemon mixture.  Pour into tray.

Top with crumbs.  Freeze until firm, 4-6 hours.

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My Take:

First off, this dessert involves eating raw eggs.  Hubbs had to really talk me into making this because it kinda creeped me out.  I decided to use graham cracker crumbs instead of chocolate cookie because that makes more sense.  I was let down when I read the minimal instructions of "Top with crumbs" because clearly that is the neatest looking part of this dish.  A little guidance would have been helpful.  I came up with using a ruler as a straight edge guide and marked the cross hatches in the top with a butter knife.  I then tried several ways to apply the crumbs without them entering the diamond crumb free zones.  The best option I found was to scoop small amounts of crumbs on the butter knife's blade edge and gently lay them in place.  I added more lemon juice and almond than the recipe called for because that's just what I do.  The flavor was pretty good. Comparing it to Opie's Lemonade Piedding, Magic Lemon Ice Box Cake takes second.  I like the tartness of the Lemonaid piedding better.  Also it does not set (as shown) so you can't cut slices.  It is pudding like, certainly not a cake!

Still better than a Leftovers Aspic any day!