Custard Tart Again

One of my dear friends, Amy is dropping by this afternoon and I've promised her a slice of Custard Tart. I was thinking this morning about Careme's Vanilla Bean Sweet Shortcrust Pastry. It's one my preferred pastry short cuts as works well and fills the house with the most divine vanilla scent. So feeling inspired I decided to shake up David Herbert's Shortcrust Pastry recipe a little, I've added some Vanilla Bean Paste, reduced the amount of water, chilled the shell again after rolling out the pastry and egg washed the shell after the initial blind bake. I'm pretty happy with the result and look forward to tucking into it. There goes my diet for another day!

Custard Tart and Decorating with Toffee

In 2009, David Herbert released 'The Really Useful Cookbook' as a follow up to 'Complete Perfect Recipes. It costs almost twice as much as his first book, contains a number of drool-worth colour photos encased in a hard cover. It is worth it? I can't say I have used it as much as 'Complete Perfect Recipes' but if you are a fan of David Herbert's non fuss food, it's a must.

My dear friend Mellie and her lovely fiancee Aaron are back in Brisbane for Christmas. So when Mel text me today to see if I had time to hang out, I just jumped at the chance and said I would bake a Custard Tart. Slightly selfish on my part as I love Custard Tarts and wanted to try out my brand new tart tin.

I've only made mini tarts from this David Herbert's Custard Tart recipe so I was keen to try out a 25cm tart. Here is a photo of the filled blind baked shell.

2 large eggs, 3 egg large egg yolks, 100g caster sugar beaten until thick. Combine with 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 1 tablespoon of brandy. Heat 500ml of cream until small bubbles appear around the edge of the saucepan and pour into the egg mixture.

Because I was expecting guests I decided to present the tart with some toffee. I placed 250g of caster sugar and a tablespoon of water in a saucepan, stirred until all the sugar was dissolved and then left the mixture to become golden. Once it was golden I then grabbed a spoon and drizzled the mixture on oiled paper to create gorgeous webbing. Here is result, served with vanilla ice cream. Mmmm.

P.S. To clean your toffee coated saucepan, add some cold water to the pan and pop it back onto the stove to dissolve. So easy!