Vanilla Custard

We’re reasonably obsessed with apple crumble in our house, and the perfect accompaniment to that is a homemade custard.

It took me a few trial and error attempts to get the technique right, but once you’ve got it you’ll definitely preference it over shop-bought.

Ingredients

• 200ml double/thick cream
• 700ml whole milk
• 4 egg yolks
• 100g caster sugar
• 1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped out

Method

1. Add the cream, milk and vanilla pod (without seeds) to a saucepan and bring to just below boiling point
2. In a bowl, whisk the yolks, sugar and vanilla seeds together
3. Combine the hot mixture with the sugar mixture while whisking steadily
4. Once combined, add the mixture back to the saucepan and heat gently while stirring constantly
5. If the end mixture is a little lumpy you can always sieve it after but a good stirring technique should reduce any need for this

Notes

Be careful when mixing the hot mixture with the sugar mixture, if you don’t whisk enough you’ll end up with a sweet scrambled egg mixture.

Inspiration

This is a basic custard recipe, but the Good Food site was where I found the pointers.