de limón or al limón?

Question

Hello everyone!

Could someone point me in the right direction in the reference section to look up when to use "a" or "de" when it come to names of dishes. I want to remind myself why one says:

una tarta de limón but una tarta de queso al limón.

cf. French. une tarte au citron and une tarte de fromage au citron

Many thanks.

Answer 1

I'll start the discussion with an educated guess. First of all don't try to draw similarities between Spanish and French. It'll drive you crazy!

I think in Spanish the idea behind una tarta de limón is it is made with limón.

In the second example the limón is added.

Answer 2

-de limón = un ... de limon = lemon pie

and al limón....? - Pibosan, May 13, 2012