Baked pastry cream, available in many different flavors depending on the dessert we want to prepare, the ingredient quantities remain the same, but the aroma and thus the taste changes, always with natural and good aromas. For this pastry cream, you can use either whole eggs or yolks, there is no precise rule, more importantly, it is to use the right amount of starch or thickener for the cream so that it remains stable and does not become too liquid during baking, which would compromise the success of the dessert, as a too liquid cream would make the base containing it too moist, whether it’s a shortcrust shell or a soft sponge cake. Now let’s see how to prepare baked pastry cream, whatever flavor we want to give it, oh, we can also make it chocolate-flavored by adding chocolate to melt into it at the end of cooking, or cocoa at the beginning along with the other ingredients, about 1.5 oz will suffice, then adjust to taste. This cream can obviously also be used to fill already baked desserts.
- Difficulty: Very easy
- Cost: Very economical
- Preparation time: 5 Minutes
- Portions: 8
- Cooking methods: Stove
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: All seasons
Ingredients for Baked Pastry Cream
- 1.5 cups milk
- 2/3 cups lemon juice (coffee – orange or milk)
- 2 whole eggs
- 5 tbsps cornstarch
- 3/4 cups sugar (same as coffee – 1/2 cup with orange juice or 1/3 cup with milk only)
- lemon or orange zest or vanilla
Tools
- 1 Saucepan
- 1 Cooking spatula
- 1 Bowl
- 1 Plastic wrap
Steps to Prepare Baked Lemon Pastry Cream or Various Flavors
In a saucepan place the 2 medium eggs, add the sugar and mix, then also add the cornstarch and mix again, finally add the milk little by little, and finally the lemon juice.
Cook while stirring continuously, until boiling. Use lemon zest to enhance the flavor, only the yellow part, not the white part which is bitter.
When the cream starts to thicken, remove the zest. Bring to a boil and the cream will be nice and thick and smooth, pour immediately into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap in direct contact, and let cool.
Once the cream is well cooled, mix it well with the whisk and then use it for our baked recipes. Great for making Grandma’s cake or a tart.
Always use a thick-bottomed saucepan or a non-stick saucepan, with a silicone spatula.
You can use the same recipe for coffee cream by replacing lemon juice with coffee, even in the same amount, for orange cream, replace with orange juice, or with milk and vanilla if you want the classic vanilla flavor of pastry cream, and so on you can flavor it in a thousand different ways to prepare a different dessert each time.
