Vanilla mille-feuille
Ingredients
- PASTRY
- 300g butter puff pastry
- 25g castor sugar
- 425g vanilla crème pâtissière
- 25g icing sugar
- VANILLA CRÈME PÂTISSIÈRE
- 700ml full-cream milk
- 1 vanilla pod
- 7 extra-large egg yolks
- 65g cornflour
- 140g castor sugar
- 50g butter
Instructions
Roll the puff pastry out on a lightly floured surface and cut into three 26cm x 12cm rectangles and refrigerate for 1 hour.
Place the rectangles on a baking tray and dredge with the castor sugar. Cover with baking paper and a grid. Bake at 180°C for 20 – 25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from the oven and cool on a cooling rack.
For the crème pâtissière, bring the milk and vanilla to the boil in a small saucepan. Whisk the egg yolks with the cornflour and sugar and slowly pour the milk onto the yolks while whisking continuously.
Transfer the mixture to a heavybased saucepan and cook, while stirring continuously, over low heat until thick. Pass through a sieve and cool.
Add the butter and mix well. Refrigerate once cool and leave to set.
To assemble the mille-feuille, place the crème pâtissière in a piping bag and pipe some onto one pastry rectangle. Arrange the second rectangle on top and pipe another layer of crème pâtissière.
Place the final rectangle on top and sift the icing sugar over. Refrigerate for 2 hours before cutting into four 6cm slices.
Based in Johannesburg, Lila Bultel manages her own French culinary business, focused on providing exclusive catering, French cooking, and pâtisserie master classes and workshops. Speciality ingredients for her recipes, such as the praliné and couverture chocolate used in these desserts, can be purchased from Lila. For more information, call 011-706-7361 or visit www.lilasfrenchcooking.co.za.
