Since I wasn't overly impressed with the Breakfast Bible version of a Dutch baby, I decided to revert to the Weight Watchers recipe that, according to my notes, I liked much better. I still think that I like it better than the BB version. But I'm no longer convinced that it's really correct to call it a Dutch baby. Last time I said that it came out "a bit" eggier than previous versions that I'd tried. This time it was basically a baked custard. A delicious baked custard. But still definitely more like a custard than a Yorkshire pudding or a pancake. Either way, I'm happy with the result. Just maybe don't use this recipe if you really want that Yorkshire pudding/Dutch baby texture.

Eggy Dutch Baby with Nectarines and Almonds

Adapted from The Breakfast Bible by Kate McMillan and Weight Watchers

Ingredients

Batter

• 1 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 1 c. milk
• 1/4 c. all-purpose flour
• 3 large eggs
• 2 Tbsp. sugar
• 1/2 Tbsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp. almond extract

Topping

• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 2 Tbsp. brown sugar
• 3-5 nectarines, sliced
• 2 tsp. lemon juice
• 1/4 c. slivered or sliced almonds, toasted
• 1-2 tsp. icing sugar (optional)

Directions

1. Place 1 Tbsp. butter in a 23cm (9") deep dish pie plate.
2. Place the pie plate in the oven and preheat to 200°C (400°F).
3. Meanwhile, combine the milk, flour, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and almond extracts and beat with a whisk until smooth.
4. Pour the batter into the hot pie plate and bake at 200°C (400°F) until set, but still slightly jiggly (15-20 minutes).
5. Meanwhile, melt 2 Tbsp. butter over medium heat.
6. Add the sugar and nectarines and cook, stirring occasionally, until sugar has dissolved and mixture thickens slightly.
7. Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice.
8. Once Dutch baby/custard is done, remove from oven and allow to cool slightly (~5 minutes).
9. Pour the nectarine over the custard and sprinkle with almonds and icing sugar (if using).
10. Cut into wedges and serve.

Lagan nu Custard (Wedding Custard)

I had a bit of down time while making the curry for dinner tonight, so I decided to try to whip up a dessert as well. This custard looked reasonably straight-forward (if a bit slow), so I figured I'd give it a go.

Lagan nu Custard

Slightly adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer

Ingredients

• 1L whole (3.25%) milk
• 1/2 c. sugar
• 1/4-1/2 tsp. cardamom seeds (from green pods), ground
• 1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 c. slivered almonds
• 1/2-1 tsp. vanilla extract¹
• 3 large eggs
• saffron (optional)
• fresh or dried rose petals (optional)

Directions

1. Bring milk to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring frequently.
2. Reduce heat to medium and continue boiling, stirring frequently, for 35 minutes.
3. Remove from heat and stir in sugar, cardamom, nutmeg, almonds, and vanilla (or other extracts).
4. Set aside to cool for 20-30 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F), grease a baking dish (or half a dozen custard cups), and boil some water.
6. If using saffron, sprinkle a few threads into the bottom of the baking dish/custard cups.
7. Once the milk mixture has cooled down, beat in the eggs and mix well.
8. Pour the custard into the prepared baking dish (or custard cups) and place the dish/cups in a pan. Pour boiling water into the pan so that it comes about halfway up the sides of the baking dish/cups.
9. Bake at 180°C (350°F) for 30-40 minutes (less for custard cups).
10. Remove from oven. Remove dish/cups from bain marie and allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before serving.
11. Sprinkle a few rose petals on top before serving if desired.

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¹ The original recipe calls for a full teaspoon of vanilla. I scaled it back to only half a teaspoon because I didn't want to overshadow the saffron. Iyer also suggests that the vanilla could be swapped out for mango, pistachio, or guava essence for an even more exotic flavour. ^Back

I had some extra egg yolks to use up and decided to try out this baked custard now that we've restocked on chocolate. I'm really pleased with how it came out. Pleasantly chocolatey and not too sweet. I served it with a dollop of unswetened whipped cream.

Chocolate Custard

Slightly adapted from the Good Egg by Marie Simmons

Ingredients

• 2 c. whole (3-4%) milk
• 85g dark chocolate
• 1/3 c. sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 large egg yolks¹
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F).
2. Heat milk over medium-low heat until hot, but not boiling.
3. Add chocolate and sugar and stir until chocolate has melted and sugar has dissolved.
4. Remove from heat and set aside.
5. Whisk together eggs, egg yolks, and vanilla.
6. Slowly whisk in the milk mixture.
7. If desired, strain the mixture. (I didn't bother with straining.)
8. Pour the mixture into a baking dish or several small ramekins.
9. Place the dish(es) into a large baking pan and pour boiling water into the pan so that it comes halfway up the sides of the dish(es).
10. Bake at 180°C (350°F) for 30 minutes.
11. My custard didn't seem quite set yet, so I removed it from the bain marie and baked it at 160°C (325°F) for another 5 minutes.
12. Remove from oven and allow to cool.
13. Serve room temperature or chilled. Top with whipped cream if desired.

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¹ My eggs were a little on the small side and I had three egg yolks to use up, so I just put them all in. ^Back

Crème Caramel (Flan)

The Kidlet's most recent birthday cake used six egg whites. This left me with half a dozen egg yolks that needed eating. I considered making crème brûlée again, but I wanted ot try something new. Flan has always made me a bit nervous. I'm not good at caramel and I've always been worried that it wouldn't set or unmold properly.

I think I did take the caramel off the heat a bit too soon. It was very pale. But, other than that, I'm really happy with how this came out! The consistency was excellent. It unmolded beautifully. And the flavour was just right.

I did end up removing it from the bain marie during the last few minutes of baking. After 40 minutes it still wasn't set, but the top was starting to brown, so I put it in for another 10 minutes without the bain marie. I was a little worried that this had turned it into scrambled eggs, but the texture was beautiful! Not curdled or eggy at all! Abandon the water bath at your own risk, of course, but it worked well for me.

Crème Caramel

Slightly adapted from Edmonds Cookery Book

Ingredients

• 3/4 c. + 2 Tbsp. sugar, divided
• 1/2 c. water
• 4 large eggs or 6 large egg yolks¹
• 1 c. whole (3.25%) milk
• 1 c. table (18%) cream
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 160°C (325°F) and get a large dish or pan ready for your bain marie.
2. Gently heat 3/4 c. of the sugar with the water, stirring until the sugar has dissolved completely.
3. Once the sugar has dissolved, stop stirring, but continue to heat, shaking the pan occasionally.
4. Cook the sugar mixture until it becomes a rich, dark caramel. Be careful not to burn it!
6. Pour the caramel into a large casserole dish (or several small ramekins). Be sure the caramel coats the entire bottom of the dish(es).
7. Whisk the remaining 2 Tbsp. sugar into the eggs (or egg yolks).
8. Whisk in the milk, cream, and vanilla.
9. Pour the custard mixture into the casserole dish with the caramel.
10. Place the casserole dish in the larger dish or pan.
11. Pour hot water into the outer dish/pan until it comes halfway up the side of the casserole dish.
12. Bake at 160°C (325°F) for 30-40 minutes.
13. Custard should be just set but still jiggly. If it's not set at the end of 40 minutes, you may need to remove it from the bain marie and bake it for another few minutes until set.
14. Remove from oven, remove the casserole from the bain marie, and place it on a wire rack to cool for an hour or two.
15. Once cooled, transfer to the fridge overnight.
16. The next day, run a blade or spatula around the edge of the casserole dish to losen it, then invert the casserole onto a plate.
17. Carefully remove the casserole to reveal your caramel-topped custard.

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¹ I was worried about the custard not setting and holding together properly without the egg whites, so I used 6 egg yolks + 1 whole egg. I think my eggs were slightly smaller than typical large/size 6 eggs though, so it may not have worked out to as much extra egg as it looks like on paper. ^Back

I've been itching to try making a queen of puddings for a couple years now. Ideally I'd been hoping to wait 'til I had some cake crumbs to use for it. I still didn't have cake crumbs for this baking, but I did have some frozen waffles and muffins! I still think cake crumbs would probably be better, but the muffins and waffles worked just fine.

Overall, this was a nice pudding, but quite bland. The custard itself didn't seem nearly sweet enough, especially next to the extremely sweet meringue. I suspect this is less of an issue when you use cake crumbs for the custard layer. Having a flavourful cake in the base would also likely give it a fuller flavour. If I were to do it with breadcrumbs again, I'd probably add more sugar and a bit of vanilla. I also think it could've used a lot more jam. The orginal recipe called for 3 Tbsp. of jam, I used 1/4 c. and that definitely seemed skimpy. I'd up it to 1/3 c. next time.

Queen of Puddings

Slightly adapted from Edmonds Cookery Book

Ingredients

• 2 c. milk
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 1 c. soft/fresh breadcrumbs or cake crumbs
• 2 large eggs, separated
• 6-8 Tbsp. sugar, divided
• 1 tsp. lemon zest
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/3 c. raspberry jam

Directions

1. Heat milk and butter until nearly boiling, then remove from heat.
2. Pour hot milk mixture over crumbs and set aside for 10 minutes.
3. Grease a 6-cup casserole dish and preheat oven to 180°C (350°F).
4. Add egg yolks to crumb mixture.
5. Add up to 1/4 c. of sugar depending on how sweet your crumbs are and how sweet you'd like your custard.
6. Pour custard mixture into prepared dish and bake at 180°C (350°F) for 25-30 minutes. (Custard should be just set.)
7. Heat the jam until runny and easy to spread.
8. Carefully spread the jam over the custard. Be careful not to break the skin.
9. Beat the egg whites until soft peaks form.
10. Beat in 1/4 c. of sugar 1 Tbsp. at a time. Beat until stiff peaks form.
11. Spread meringue on top of the jam. (Pipe it on if you want to be fancy.)
12. Bake at 180°C (350°F) for 10-15 minutes.
13. Serve hot.

I'm too tired to do a properly detailed write-up for this right now, but it was really tasty despite my repeated goofs while preparing it. I've cut back the sugar slightly as I found it a tiny bit too sweet for my taste.

Masala Chai Crème Brûlée

Slightly adapted from Vegetarian Indian Cooking with Your Instant Pot

Ingredients

• 1 c. heavy (35%) cream
• 1 c. whole (3.25%) milk
• 3 black tea bags
• 6 green cardamom pods
• 6 black peppercorns
• 4 whole cloves
• 1/2 (3") cinnamon stick
• 1/4 tsp. ground ginger
• 5 large egg yolks
• 9 Tbsp. sugar, divided
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• pinch of salt

Directions

1. Combine cream, milk, tea bags, cardamom, peppercorns, cloves, cinnamon, and ginger in a heatproof (glass or steel) container.
2. Pour 1 1/2 c. of water into the InstantPot and then place the container of cream mixture on a trivet in the InstantPot.
3. Seal the InstantPot and pressure cook on high for 1 minute. Immediately release the pressure and remove the container from the pot. Set aside for 5-10 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, combine egg yolks with 5 Tbsp. of the sugar, vanilla, and salt.
5. Whisk the egg yolk mixture until it becomes pale yellow.
6. Once steeped, strain the cream mixture, reserving the liquids and discarding the solids.
7. Gradually whisk the cream mixture into the egg yolk mixture.
8. Pour the custard into a casserole dish or several small ramekins.
9. Cover the casserole/ramekins with foil or a heatproof lid.
10. Add another 1/2 c. of water to the InstantPot and place the casserole/ramekins into the pot on a trivet so that they're elevated above the water. (If using a casserole dish, make sure that you can get it back out again when you're done; if it's a tight fit consider running twine or similar below it that you can use to pull it out.)
    
11. Seal the InstantPot and pressure cook on high for 7 minutes. Allow a 10 minute natural release.
12. Remove casserole/ramekins from InstantPot and allow to cool to room temperature.
13. Sprinkle with remaining sugar and place under broiler for 3-5 minutes to melt and caramelize the sugar.

Now that I've discovered trifle, I've been having fun dreaming up all sorts of different flavour combinations. I haven't had a chance to try most of them yet, but I did make some gingerbread on the weekend, so I figured I'd give my gingerbread trifle idea a whirl. So, instead of sponge filled with raspberry jam, I had gingerbread filled with chopped stem ginger and ginger syrup. The raspberries got swapped out for sweet cherries. The plain vanilla custard became eggnog custard. I stuck to the standard whipped cream on top. Although I did add vanilla and icing sugar, so I guess it was technically "cream chantilly". And, to top it all off, a few glacé cherries and some chopped crystallized ginger. All-in-all, I'd say it was a pretty pleasing effect!

Gingerbread Trifle

Ingredients

• 1/2 recipe sticky gingerbread
• 3-4 knobs stem ginger, chopped + 1-2 Tbsp. ginger syrup
• 3 c. fresh or frozen sweet cherries, pitted and halved
• 1/2 c. custard powder
• 6 Tbsp. vanilla sugar
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 4 c. milk
• 2 Tbsp. rum
• 500mL heavy (35%) cream
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/4 c. icing sugar
• Glacé cherries, to garnish
• Crystallized ginger, chopped, to garnish

Directions

1. Split the gingerbread and fill it with stem ginger and ginger syrup.
2. Cut into cubes.
3. Cover the bottom of the serving dish with cake cubes.
4. Top the cake with half the cherries.
5. Combine the custard powder, sugar, nutmeg, and cinnamon in a pot.
6. Add a small amount of milk and whisk until smooth.
7. Whisk in rum and remaining milk.
8. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring, until thickened.
9. Pour half of custard over cake and cherries.
10. Layer remaining cake into bowl on top of custard and top with remaining cherries.
11. Pour remaining custard over, cover, and place in fridge until chilled.
12. Combine cream, vanilla, and icing sugar in a blender.
13. Blend on high setting until cream is stiff and spreadable.
14. Spread cream over top of trifle.
15. Garnish with glacé cherries and crystallized ginger as desired.

This recipe shows up in Edmonds as "Sherry Trifle". I followed that recipe but omitted the sherry. It still came out plenty moist and delicious with the added benefit of being kid-friendly.

I also didn't really weigh or measure anything for this one. I made one batch of three minute sponge (in a 9" square pan), split it and filled it with raspberry jam, and cut it into cubes. I then just tossed jammy cake cubes into the bottom of a glass bowl 'til they'd formed a nice layer and then poured a good bit of custard over top with a layer of frozen raspberries on top of it. Covered that with the rest of the cake cubes and even more custard and raspberries.

I think I must've either had more cake than the recipe called for, or a different shaped bowl because the 2 c. of custard they get you to make didn't end up being nearly enough! I ended up running out and making a second (2-c.) batch of custard. The allotted 300mL of heavy cream also wasn't nearly enough. I think used closer to 600mL -- it was half a litre + whatever was left in the other carton -- to cover the whole top of the trifle. I did whip it in the blender rather than using beaters though. And I know that generally results in a lower volume whip. But I wanted it to be stable in the fridge for several days while we ate it, so it seemed like a worthwhile trade-off.

Based on how much cream and custard I went through I'm guessing that I probably had ~400g of sponge rather than the recommended 200g. And I have no idea how much jam I used. I just spread jam on the cake until it was nicely filled. The recipe calls for 1/4 c. And, looking at the jar, I don't think 1/2 c. would be an unreasonable estimate of how much I used.

For the sake of simplicity I'm just going to copy the amounts and proportions directly from Edmonds even though I used more of basically everything. If you want a large trifle though, definitely don't hesitate to double everything!

Raspberry Trifle

Slightly adapted from Edmonds Cookery Book

Ingredients

• 200g three minute sponge
• 1/4 c. raspberry jam
• 2 c. fresh (or frozen) raspberries
• 1/4 c. custard powder
• 3 Tbsp. (vanilla) sugar
• 2 c. whole milk
• 300mL heavy (35%) cream
• 2 Tbsp. icing sugar
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 Tbsp. slivered almonds, toasted (optional)

Directions

1. Split the sponge and fill it with the raspberry jam.
2. Cut the filled sponge into cubes.
3. Place the sponge cubes in the bottom of a glass bowl (or trifle dish).
4. Add the fruit to the bowl on top of the cake.
5. Combine the custard powder with the sugar.
6. Pour in a small amount of milk and whisk until smooth.
7. Add the remaining milk while whisking to form a uniform mixture.
8. Bring to a boil over medium heat, whisking often, until thickened.
9. Pour custard over cake cubes.
10. Chill until custard is cold or overnight.
11. Add icing sugar and vanilla to cream.
12. Whip cream using beaters for a more voluminous, but less stable topping. Whip cream using a blender or food processor for a stiffer, more stable topping.
13. Serve as is or garnish with slivered almonds and/or more raspberries.