Crème pâtissière is one of those lovely things that is so versatile that you can’t afford to not have this recipe in your culinary arsenal. Really, if you know how to make pastry cream, you’ll instantly have about a billion lusciously decadent dessert recipes at your fingertips. You’ll be able to curl the toes of your dinner guests with ease. Makes 8 cups.
Course Dessert
Cuisine French
Prep Time 20minutes
Cook Time 5minutes
Total Time 25minutes
Servings 8servings
Calories 281kcal
Author Stephanie Stiavetti
Ingredients
1cupheavy cream
1 1/2cupsof milkdivided
1wholevanilla beansplit lengthwise down the middle
1/3cupsugar
6largeegg yolks
Fewcupscold water
Fewcupsice
6tablespoonscornstarch
1/4cup (1/2 a stick)butterat room temperature
Instructions
Combine heavy cream with 1 cup of milk in a medium saucepan (reserve the remaining 1/2 cup of milk). Using a butter knife, scrape the tiny seeds out of the vanilla bean and add them to the cream mixture, tossing the scraped pod in as well.
Bring the cream to just a simmer, then remove from heat and allow to sit for 15 minutes. Fish out spent vanilla pod and discard.
Combine sugar and egg yolks in a medium-sized heatproof bowl and whisk vigorously for 30 seconds to ensure the sugar is dissolved.
Halfway fill a large bowl with cold water and add a few handfuls of ice to make sure the water is very cold. Keep more ice handy in case what you’ve added to the bowl melts.
In a cup, combine cornstarch with the remaining 1/2 cup of milk, stirring with a fork until cornstarch is completely dispersed. Make sure there are no lumps along the bottom of the cup, hiding anywhere in the corners, lest you end up with lumps in your pastry cream. In case you were wondering, this is called making a slurry.
Place the saucepan containing the cream mixture over a medium heat. Again bring the cream just to a simmer, making sure not to bring it to a full boil. Once you see bubbles begin to form around the edges of the saucepan and a fair amount of steam beginning to rise from the cream’s surface, remove it from the heat.
Slowly pour the hot cream into the sugar and egg yolks, whisking constantly. The goal here is to add the hot cream slowly enough that the eggs don’t scramble, so pour in a little bit at a time and whisk well before you add some more. If you’ve got another person handy, have them pour the hot cream in a slow, thin stream while you whisk.
Pour the cream and eggs back into the saucepan and stir in the cornstarch slurry, then resume constant stirring over medium heat until the mixture is very thick. Set the base of the saucepan in your bowl of ice cold water (add more ice to the water if you have to) and stir quickly until the cream has cooled somewhat but still retains some heat, about one minute.
Add the butter and stir until the butter is completely mixed in and you’ve got a smooth cream. Scoop into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, making sure to press the wrap against the surface of the cream to prevent a skin from forming. Seal and store in the fridge until you’re ready to use it.