So, the holiday is well and truly over sadly. Back to sunny
Scotland and almost sub-zero temperatures. Funny to think that just last week
we were walking along the beach, wearing just our trunks! Doing that on the
east coast of Scotland right now could have some dire consequences!!
But, as I promised, in my last post I wanted to bake
something that I had on holiday – the custard tarts that I enjoyed. I have seen
these called Pasteis De Nata or Pastel De Nata, not sure if one is the plural
of the other, but it doesn’t affect how they taste – so let’s crack on.
There are various recipes all over the place, and I cobbled
together a few basic ones. I have added cinnamon, which doesn’t appear in a lot
of them, but I wanted to include the spice, as it would remind me of the eggy
custard that my Granny Hetty made for me when I was little. Also, a lot of the
recipes have you making your own pastry. I have one mantra in life (when it
comes to baking anyway) and that is ‘Life is too short to make your own
pastry’. Particularly when you can pick a ready-made pack from Tesco!
Yield: 12 delicious tarts
Ingredients:
1 pack ready rolled puff pastry
240 ml milk
3 tablespoons cornflour
200 grams caster sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
6 egg yolks
Method:
Pre-heat your oven to 180oC. Now, I sprayed my 12
cup square muffin pan with some non-stick spray, not essential, but grease just
to be on the safe side! Line each muffin well with puff pastry and trim off any
excess. Set pan aside.
Whisk together the 6 egg yolks in a bowl and set aside. In a
saucepan place the milk, cornflour, sugar, vanilla and cinnamon, over medium
heat, stir until slightly thickened. Now drizzle half of the warm milk mix – VERY
SLOWLY - into the egg yolks, stirring constantly. Tipping it all in would
result in scrambled eggs, which you really don’t want. Add the yolk mix into
the saucepan with the remaining milk mix and heat until boiling and thickened,
stirring constantly.
Remove from the heat and divide the custard mix into the
12 pastry lined wells.
Pop this into the oven for 20 minutes. The custard mix will
rise high during baking and start to darken. Once removed from the oven, it
will shrink back and sink slightly which is normal, don’t worry!
Leave the tarts to cool completely and then remove
carefully from the pan (I used a small fork to assist me).
These custard tarts are actually better than I had in
Portugal I have to say and that is probably down to my love of cinnamon. If you
don’t like cinnamon or want to be totally authentic then omit it, no harm done.
The pastry is lovely with the thick, spiced vanilla filling – and even nicer
with a hot cup of coffee! Enjoy :)
I am entering these delicacies into September's Alphabakes challenge, hosted by this month by Caroline Makes and ably assisted by The More Than Occasional Baker. This month the letter is 'P' and luckily both Portuguese Custard Tarts and Pasteis De Nata hit the mark!
I am entering these delicacies into September's Alphabakes challenge, hosted by this month by Caroline Makes and ably assisted by The More Than Occasional Baker. This month the letter is 'P' and luckily both Portuguese Custard Tarts and Pasteis De Nata hit the mark!
Oh, these look SO good! I think I have some puff in the freezer ..... eggs, milk,..yep, I think we've got everything we need to give these a go!
ReplyDeleteThanks for another great recipe! : )
They look really authentic Stuart! Where did you get your square muffin pan, I've never seen one before?
ReplyDeleteThanks Janice, I got the pan fromTK Maxx - my favourite shop ever!!
DeleteMmm these look so yummy!!
ReplyDeleteObrigado Kat!
DeleteDefinitely one of my favourite pastries and yours look lovely. I've never eaten them in Portugal, though. My downfall was a Portuguese bakery near where I was working in London.
ReplyDeleteThat must have been one amazing bakery - the Portuguese love their bakes!!
DeleteMmm, a great reminder of holidays past, and they look really cute in the tin! Thanks for entering them in Alphabakes.
ReplyDeleteThey look great x try putting lemonzest in the milk that was a tip i got from one of my Portuguese family member and they love them x
ReplyDelete