So, I managed to drag myself away from trying to track down Pikachu, and spent Sunday afternoon cooking up these hulk-green chocolate lime bars. I might have gone a little OTT on the food colouring. Let that be a lesson to you.
There are a tonne of limes in our fridge at the moment, due to an unfortunate lime over-ordering incident. But, thankfully I absolutely adore all things lime – key lime pie is one of my all-time favourite desserts for a start. And let’s not forget the deliciousness that is a chocolate lime candy, which were my inspiration for these little squares.
The first incarnation of these bars had a ginger snap and coconut base, which was delicious but also really way too thick. So, on my second attempt, I needed to make sure the base was a lot thinner. And more chocolatey, apparently.
I also increased the amount of topping, doubling up from one tin of condensed milk to two, and increasing everything else proportionally. You are going to need eight whole limes for this recipe, which is kind of a lot. But the pay-off is a seriously zesty topping that you are not going to be able to get enough of.
As mentioned above, I did add some green food colouring to this batch. You might say too much food colouring. Halloween is still over three months away, right? So feel free to scale back on the colour, or even leave it out altogether.
I just wanted them to look lime coloured 🙂
The Oreo base is incredibly easy to make, and I am going to start using it in a whole bunch of other recipes from now on. I definitely think a cheesecake could benefit from the salty-sweet Oreo flavour. Plus, I feel like this recipe is begging to be turned into a full-on key lime pie, complete with Oreo pie crust. Because pastry pie crusts are just too much like hard work.
I crushed the Oreos the old fashioned way, with a rolling pin and a sandwich bag. But if you have a food processor or a blender, then this recipe would be a whole lot quicker. Because the Oreos are filled with creme, they tend to not want to break apart as easy as, say, graham crackers. But it can be done. Just keep at it.
The only difficult thing when it comes to these chocolate lime bars (apart from not eating them all in one sitting) is knowing when they are ready to come out of the oven. My advice is to bake them for 25 minutes, and then assume they are done. Check on them before that point, and if at anytime they start to look even slightly brown on top, then whip them out straight away.
Any questions, then let me know. We’ve still got a bunch of limes in the freezer, which have ‘lime curd’ written all over them. So watch out for that sometime soon.
- 300g (10.5oz) Oreos
- 120g (½ cup) unsalted butter
- Juice and zest of 8 limes
- 794g (28oz) sweetened condensed milk
- 6 large egg yolks
- Pinch of salt
- Green food colouring (optional)
- Preheat your oven to 180°C/355°F (160°C fan) and line an 8 inch square brownie tin with tin foil - there's no need to grease.
- Crush the Oreos into crumbs using a food processor, blender, or by putting them in a strong plastic bag and beating them with a rolling pin. The finer the crumbs, the better the base. Pour the crumbs into a bowl.
- Melt the butter in the microwave or in a saucepan, and pour onto the Oreo crumbs. Mix together with a wooden spoon until all the Oreo crumbs have been coated.
- Pour the Oreo mixture into the lined tin. Make sure the base is evenly distributed to all the corners, and then press down with a spoon or your hands until it is level and compact.
- Pop into the oven for 10-12 minutes. It will feel soft and unbaked when you remove it, but leave to cool on a wire rack and it will harden up. Make sure it is completely cool before adding the lime topping.
- Grate the zest from the limes into a large mixing bowl, and then add the juice. This can be a bit time consuming, but using fresh limes rather than bottled juice will make the bars taste so much better.
- Add the condensed milk and six egg yolks to the bowl, along with a pinch of salt, and then whisk either by hand or with an electric whisk. The mixture will be fairly liquid, so doing this by hand may result in less splatter. Whisk for a couple of minutes, until everything is nicely incorporated. If you want to add green food colouring, this is the time to do so, and give it a whisk until the colour has evenly distributed.
- Pour the lime mixture onto the pre-baked Oreo crust, and tilt the tin so that the mixture gets to all the corners. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes. There is no real way to tell if these are ready, but if the top has started to brown at all, then take it out of the oven immediately. Try not to touch the top of these bars, as this will leave marks.
- Place the tin on a wire rack until completely cool, and then pop the tin into the fridge to chill for at least 3 hours. Once chilled, remove from the tin and cut into 16 pieces using a sharp knife. Wipe the knife with a cloth between cuts to stop the edges looking muddy.
- These bars will stay fresh in the fridge in an airtight container for 5-7 days. To freeze, place the whole slab or the individual bars into an airtight container for up to 2 months. Defrost in the fridge.
