This is the best lemon bar I’ve had yet. This Strawberry Lemon Bar recipe is vegan-friendly, easy to make, and requires no fancy alternative to the eggs traditionally used in lemon bars.
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This recipe requires around 30 minutes of active cooking time and at least 2 hours for chilling and setting. This recipe will make at least 24 bars depending on the size you choose to cut them. This strawberry lemon bar recipe is free of most major allergens: dairy-free, egg-free, nut-free, soy-free and can easily be adapted to be made gluten-free as well.
What ingredients go into a vegan strawberry lemon bar?
The great thing about this vegan lemon bar recipe is it doesn’t require any fancy alternatives to the animal-based ingredients typically used in lemon bar recipes. All the ingredients used are items commonly already found in a pantry or can be easily found at your local supermarket.
Crust:
- Flour
- Sugar
- Salt
- Vegan Butter
Filling:
- Lemon Juice
- Coconut Milk
- Sugar
- Salt
- Vanilla Extract
- Cornstarch
- Strawberries
- Optional Turmeric or Yellow Vegan Food Coloring
How do you make lemon bars without eggs?
Lemon bars similar to lemon curd are a sweet and tangy custard traditionally made from lemon juice, sugar, and eggs. I often would hear people talk about how hard it was to make these sweets since working with the eggs was a temperamental task. While I’ve never made non-vegan lemon curd or bars to weigh in on this topic myself, I have to say these Vegan Strawberry Lemon Bars are incredibly easy to make because they don’t require eggs. What do they have instead? Cornstarch! You can use arrowroot or any other starch on your preference if you don’t want to use cornstarch. Cornstarch is a common thickener in sauces, puddings, and some beverages that is more affordable and less tricky to cook with than eggs.
How to make vegan lemon bars without tofu?
A lot of vegan lemon bar recipes I saw out there require tofu to make them. I wanted to make this recipe more allergen-friendly by making it soy-free. Also, I’ve yet to cook a sweet dish with tofu and I am somewhat intimidated by it. I don’t doubt those recipes are good, I just have yet to dive into that method of making sweets and desserts yet.
Instead of tofu, I used creamy coconut milk to make this vegan lemon bar recipe. I used the Aroy-D brand boxed coconut milk that you can find at your local Asian market or here on Amazon*. If you can’t find this one you can simply use a full-fat can of coconut milk.
Strawberry Lemon Bar Substitutions:
Gluten-Free: This is an easy recipe to make gluten-free by simply replacing the all-purpose flour with equal parts of gluten-free baking flour. This one from King Arthur Flour* is our favorite.
Coconut Milk: If you don’t want to use coconut milk you can use any non-dairy milk you’d like. I personally just like the flavor and thickness of coconut milk and thought it would compliment the lemon and strawberry flavor. It’s also not a strong coconut flavor in the first place if that is a concern you have.
Strawberries: If you don’t want to use strawberries you can instead use any other equal portion of fruit blended. You can also make this a normal lemon bar recipe by omitting the strawberry puree and only using 1/2 a cup of corn starch.
If you make this recipe we’d love to hear from you down below in the comment sections. You can also tag us on one of our social media or use our hashtag #vegantheway. You can also stay up to date with our new recipes and post by subscribing to our email notifications.
Thank you for checking out our Strawberry Lemon Bar recipe and make sure to check out our other vegan recipes like our Vegan Chickpea Protein Cookie Balls or our Vegan Char Siu Bao/ Vegan Chinese BBQ Pork Buns
Vegan Strawberry Lemon Bar Recipe
Equipment
- Oven
- 9x13 Baking Dish
- Mixing Bowl
- Saucepan
Ingredients
Shortbread Crust:
- 2 cups All-Purpose Flour
- 1/2 cup Sugar
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1 cup Vegan Butter (I used butter flavored Crisco for this.)
Strawberry and Lemon Filling
- 1 1/4 cup Lemon Juice
- 2 cups Sugar
- 1/4 tsp Salt
- 1 3/4 cup Coconut Milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup 1 tbsp Cornstarch
- 1 cup (230 grams) Strawberries
- 1/8 tsp Turmeric or Vegan Yellow Food Coloring (Optional)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350° F. Prepare a 9 x 13 dish by spraying with nonstick spray and lining with parchment paper the hangs off the edges for easy removal later.
- In a bowl add and mix the flour, sugar, and salt.
- Next, cut the vegan button into cubes or smaller pieces and add tp they dry ingredients. With your hands or a potato masher mix and press the ingredients together until it reaches a crumbly texture. Then press the dough together to form a dough ball.
- Place the dough ball into the prepared pan. With your hand press the dough into pan until smooth and even. My edges were a bit thick, you can press the dough up along the side of the pan as well if you’d like.
- Bake the crust in the oven for 20 minutes or until the edges become lightly browned. Once done remove from the oven and let it rest on the countertop. Leave the oven heat on since we will be baking the bars again.
- While the crust is baking add the strawberries to a blender or food processor and blend until your left with a puree. Next, add 1 tbsp of the cornstarch to the puree and blend again so it’s thoroughly mixed in.
- During or after the crust is has baked, add the lemon juice, sugar, vanilla extract, salt, coconut milk, remaining cornstarch, and optional turmeric or food coloring to a saucepan and whisk until the ingredients are well combined.
- Over medium heat using silicone or wooden spoon continue to stir the mixture while it heats and thickens. Make sure to stir the bottom of the pan to help the sugar and cornstarch melted and mix into the rest of the ingredients. Once the mixture has significantly thickened, pour ¾ of it onto the crust in an even layer.
- Add the pureed strawberry mixture into the remaining lemon filling. Mix and heat the mixture a bit longer until it’s properly thickened again after adding the strawberry puree. My strawberry mixture didn’t get quite as thick as the lemon layer, but it will set just the same.
- Next, add the strawberry fillings on top of the lemon layer.
- Return the pan to the oven and cook the bars for 20 minutes at 350 degrees.
- Once cooked remove from the oven and allow it to cool on a countertop for around an hour. After place the pan into the fridge for at least 2 hours to properly cool and set. The longer it chills the more it will firm.
- Once chilled remove the bars from the pan by pulling it up by the overhanging parchment paper.
- Place on a cutting board and cut the bar into at least 24 squares. Sprinkle with powdered sugar or top with lemon and strawberry slices. Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days.
Hi! Do they taste coconutty? Thinking of the base being coconut milk.
I made these about a week ago and we just finished them. They were so good. I’d never made lemon bars, vegan or not, so this was a first for me. I followed the recipe exactly, it was easy and my bars turned out great. Very flavorful and tart with the right amount of sweetness, but not too sweet. Highly recommend. I’ll def make again.