Home-made custard

Hmmmm… who doesn’t remember a delicious homemade custard finished with relish by the teaspoonful? In pastry-making, it’s probably the second most widely used cream after crème pâtissière. We tend to confine it to making floating islands or chocolate fondants, and that’s a shame!

Although it was invented at the English court in the 16th century, it has become a staple of French patisserie that needs to be mastered to perfection. Not least because it serves as the base for Bavarian cream, which is a regular feature of CAP pastry recipes such as bavarois and charlottes.

In fact, although it can be scary, this custard is quite simple to make. What’s more, homemade custard is SO much better than the brick version, so it would be a shame to go without! It’s all about the cooking: ideally, you should have a thermometer to check the temperature, but I’ll tell you a few tricks for doing without one. But before we get down to the nitty-gritty, a question for a thousand sesterces.

Is custard custard?

That’s right! First introduced to the English royal court in the 16th century, custard takes its name from its origins. And if you happen to travel to England, you’ll see that it’s still very popular across the Channel!

Making vanilla milk

If you’ve ever made a crème pâtissière, homemade custard should be no problem at all. The basic recipe is the same: boiling milk is poured over a mixture of sugar and eggs and cooked over a low heat. The only difference is that custard contains no flour or cornstarch. So it won’t thicken as it cooks like a custard, and will retain a much smoother texture.

The first step is to boil the milk with the split vanilla pod. If you have time, you can do this step the day before, as the milk will be all the more fragrant. All you have to do is return the milk to the boil the next day, as it’s important that the milk is hot when poured over the egg/sugar mixture.

Making the sweet mixture

In the bowl of a food processor, or simply in a bowl, combine the egg yolks and sugar. The mixture does not need to be whitened.

Cooking custard

When the milk boils, remove the saucepan from the heat and strain out the vanilla pod pieces.

Pour the hot milk over the egg/sugar mixture, continuing to stir vigorously so that the eggs don’t cook on contact with the hot milk.

Return the mixture to low heat, stirring with a spatula. The mixture is cooked when it reaches 83° degrees.

How to make sure your custard doesn’t go wrong?

Custard can be more or less cooked, and therefore more or less thick. However, to make sure you don’t mess it up, it’s always better to undercook the custard than overcook it (it will then have a very pronounced eggy taste). But normally, if you don’t exceed 83°, you shouldn’t have any problems!

The trick to making homemade custard without a thermometer

As not everyone has a probe at home, I’m going to share my tip for cooking cream. If you don’t have a thermometer, you can check when the custard is thick enough to coat the spatula. Normally, this happens when the bubbles start to disappear from the mixture. You can also make a fingerprint on the spatula, which should remain marked.

And that’s it, you’re all set to make a fantastic homemade custard (and if you still miss out, check out my article 7 tips for catching up on almost any recipe!).