The Custard Method

A custard is defined as a dairy product that is thickened with eggs (crème brûlée, crème anglaise, crème caramel, flan, quiche) or with eggs and starch (pastry cream, chocolate pudding). It is a usually sweet, very moist, tender gel of egg protein. Custards are typically classified as boiled, stirred, and baked and are grouped in this book under the boiled custard or pastry cream, baked custard, or stirred custard or anglaise methods.

A boiled custard is thickened with eggs and cornstarch over direct heat. The idea is that heat will coagulate the proteins in the starch and gelatinize the cornstarch, which will in turn thicken the liquid, which is generally milk. The mixture, in theory, will have to boil for this to happen, but as you will read in the method below, boiling is not necessary. There is a way to make a thick, smooth pastry cream without submitting it to intense heat. Because we do not need to boil this custard, it is not necessary to call it a boiled custard; we will simply call it pastry cream.