Lemon Drizzle Bars

I know its been a while, after being away life took over and I haven't had the chance to get into the kitchen and do what i do best. So let me explain my time away and make you all jealous of my tales of relaxation and indulgence. We had breakfast in bed on my birthday, a full array of pastries, cereals, fruit and fresh orange juice, it was heavenly! All the leisure facilities were open to us so we spent evenings in the pool and in the hot tub, it really was pure relaxation for three days. We dinned in the hotels restaurant both evenings, the food was amazing! Fresh flavours in a really beautiful setting. The last day we had our treatments, Jake treated me to a full body massage... I was slightly apprehensive one. because i have never had one before and two, because i am the most ticklish person on my legs but to my surprise it was beautiful. 

After all that fun and relaxation it was time to smack back down to reality with a full weekend at work, so by Sunday evening when I got home all i kept thinking was "What massage?" All together though I had a fab birthday and got so many baking things to add to my ever growing collection, which reminds me I still need to finish cleaning my cupboards out and put my birthday things away. Yes, they are still in the bags they came in, in my bedroom.. yes, it was my birthday nearly two weeks ago and yes, i am lazy! But i have no where for them to go, if you have been to my house you will know storage is an issue.       

Mum got me a mini loaf tin for my birthday which I have been looking at for a while so with this bake I wanted to try them out. I've always wanted to do mini lemon drizzle bars so this was the perfect opportunity. Plus I love lemon drizzle, especially the icing. 

Makes 8 Bars

Equipment 

Mini loaf tray

Bowl

Wooden spoon 

Grater 

Lemon juicer 

Piping bag 

Ingredients 

175g Self raising flour

1 tsp Baking powder
175g Caster sugar
3 Eggs
175g Butter/Margarine
1 tsp Vanilla extract
Zest of one lemon
Juice of one lemon

For the Icing 
Zest of one lemon
Juice of one and a half lemons
150g Icing sugar (more maybe required)

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Grease the loaf tin.

2. There really is no effort needed for the sponge mixture, put all the ingredients together in a bowl and mix until smooth. You can use an electric mixture for ease and time but for me sometimes the motion of mixing all the ingredients together to make something scrummy gives a satisfaction like no other.

3. Once all the ingredients are well combined and smooth, split the mixture equally into the tin and put in the oven for 10-12 mins, to check if they are cooked use a cake tester or knife and put into the middle of the cakes, if they come out clean then they are cooked.

4. Transfer on to a wired rack and leave to cool completely before icing.

5. For the lemon icing, put the icing sugar into a bowl, add the lemon zest and mix. Then add the lemon juice and mix. You will want the mixture to be thick so that you can pipe it onto the bars, if you find the mixture is to runny keep adding icing sugar until it becomes thick. Once thick pour into a piping bag, I use disposable ones just for ease, snip the bottom of or use a thin straight piping nozzle and drizzle back and forwards over the bars.