- Today, we're making one of my all-time favorite treats.
It's called pastry cream,
and for those of you who don't know,
it's this magical custard that you use to fill eclairs,
cream puffs, fruit tarts, and anything you want.
You can even pipe it directly into your mouth,
which I'll be doing after this scene.
(chuckles)
I'm adding two cups of whole milk into a saucepan.
For this recipe, you could use vanilla extract,
but I'm gonna go a little bit all out
and use about a teaspoon and a half
of this vanilla bean paste.
It's made with vanilla beans,
and it is (inhales deeply) amazing.
It also has the added bonus of having
all the little specks of vanilla.
Now, I'm gonna heat this over medium/low heat
and whisk it up, just to let that vanilla infuse
and to warm the milk up as well.
Now, I'm separating six eggs.
So, yolks, we're gonna use today.
The whites you can set aside and use them
to make a meringue or an egg white omelet
or whatever you'd like.
And six eggs.
Now, in a medium bowl, add the six egg yolks,
2/3 of a cup of sugar, and whisk together well.
(whisk clanking)
Gonna lift it up and use some muscle power.
(whisk clanking)
(dog barks)
Okay. (laughs)
I don't know if you can tell the difference,
but this is like a nice beautiful light lemony color now.
Very sunshine-y.
Oof, also pretty thick (Hands smacking)
Now we're gonna add in 1/4 of cornstarch,
and whisk it well so there's no lumps.
The cornstarch is kind of a cheat,
but so much better to have a pastry cream
that's nice and thick than to have one that's runny.
(whisk clanking)
Okay, that is nice and light and fluffy.
I don't know if you can see,
but it's a really nice consistency.
I have some really nice warm,
steamy milk infused with vanilla.
It looks amazing with all those little specks
of the bean in there.
I need to temper this.
So, what I'm gonna do is take 1/4 cup of this hot milk
and then drizzle it in slowly,
while I vigorously whisk.
Basically, you're getting this egg yolk mixture warm
with the 1/4 cup so it won't cook the eggs
and make everything scrambled and gross.
Has to be silky and smooth.
Just gonna place this in here like a little nest.
(whisk clanking)
That's much better.
(whisk clanking)
This smells like heaven.
(whisk clanking)
Okay.
Well mixed, this is gonna go over heat now,
while we whisk continuously until it thickens up
and changes into amazing pastry cream.
Let's transfer this back to our pot,
and take it back onto the heat.
I placed the pan over medium/high heat,
and I'm whisking continuously with a French whisk.
It's a narrower whisk that can get the corners of the pan
so that nothing gets left behind.
It just changed consistency.
You can see it thickened up.
Turning the heat off.
(whisk scraping)
And it's like magic.
Nothing happens, nothing happens, nothing happens.
Everything happens at once.
Okay, it's all done.
I'm gonna whisk in one tablespoon of cold butter,
but take a look at the consistency right now.
Look at that.
It is amazing.
All those little specks of vanilla, it's gorgeous.
One tablespoon of cold butter,
plop it in, whisk it, and it'll melt
and infuse into the pastry cream.
It's like the pastry version of putting ice in water
(laughs) to cool it down.
Okay, that butter melted.
It smells amazing.
I might've tasted it off camera too.
(whisk banging)
The last step is to transfer this to a bowl,
and we're gonna cover it with some plastic
and chill it, then we can use it.
All right.
So, we don't want a skin
to develop on top while this is setting.
We're gonna cover it with plastic,
and just press the plastic down so there's no air gaps.
Refrigerate this until it's nice and cool,
and then it's time to start piping your eclairs,
your cream puffs, eating it by the spoonful like I would,
whatever you want.
I'm so excited.
My pastry cream is all set.
It is really firm, almost like Jello,
but more and more and more delicious.
It is amazing.
This stuff is perfect for filling eclairs,
filling cream puffs.
You can use it in fruit tarts as the base.
You can even put it like in between vanilla cake layers
and have the best experience of your life.
I promise you.
Mm, my mouth is literally watering
because I have a spoonful in front of me right now
and I'm just gonna be taking bite after bite
as soon as we're done with this take.
Anyways, if you want to lighten this, by the way,
you can just whip it up with some whipped cream.
So take the whip cream, fold it into your pastry cream,
and now you have diplomat cream.
Let's just kinda go further because this is a full recipe,
but it doesn't make a ton.
So, if you're making a huge amount of eclairs,
you can cheat it a little bit
and add that whipped cream in there.
Anyways, it's time for our bite.
Mm.
It is so, so good.
It's really one of my favorite things to eat.
I hope you get a chance to make this recipe.
Thank you for watching.
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