From the boulangeries of Paris to the whole world, a velvety custard baked inside a brisèe basket!
ingredients for 6 servings (total cost about 8,5€ with organic ingredients)
a portion of basic brisèe dough for tarts made with
- 200 g pastry flour
- 100 g di burro
- 50 g water
- 25 sugar
- 3 g salt
a portion of pastry cream made with
- 1 litro di latte intero
- 4 whole eggs (200 g)
- 90 g cornstarch (maizena)
- 200 g di zucchero
- peels from 2 lemons and 2 oranges
- 1 vanilla bean or 1 cinnamon stick and 1 star anise
- un pizzico di sale
The Flan Patissier (pastry flan), or Flan Parisien is an iconic pastry preparation found in every Parisian Boulangerie. It’s the quintessential boulanger’ s pastry, consisting of a short crust base in the form of a deep basket, filled with a creamy flan batter. The flan batter is none other than a pastry cream, suitable for baking, that is, made with whole eggs instead of yolks. (4 whole eggs instead of 8 egg yolks).
Indeed, when preparing a custard that will bake in the oven, it is better to make it with whole eggs or, at least, lower the amount of yolks, because the yolks create a “lid” on top during baking, that prevents the steam from escaping and the custard inflates, risking even its potential breaking. You should keep in mind, though, that the more egg whites your flan contains, the more compact it will be. If you want to gain smoothness, reduce the number of whites and compensate with yolks. For every white you substract, add 2 yolks.
It is not difficult to make a pastry flan, it just requires time and lots of patience, because after every stage of the preparation, you need to let it rest and chill in the fridge, otherwise faillure is, almost, certain. So, we will be doing this several times.
To make it, we begin by preparing a portion of basic brisèe dough. Once we form the dough, we let it rest in the fridge for several hours, ideally overnight.
We also make a portion of pastry cream, using the ingredients given here. When ready, we cover with clnig film in contact and we let it cool at the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
While the custard cools, we remove the dough from the fridge and we roll it out to a disc of a diameter of about 40 cm and a thickness of about 0,5 cm. We line a well buttered tart ring of 20 cm diameter and 5-6 cm height and we return it to the fridge for at least 30 minutes to chill.
We take the chilled shell out of the fridge as well as the cooled custard, we whip it to loosen it a little and we pour it inside the shell. Then, we return the tart shell, as it is filled with the raw custard to the fridge for at least 4 hours or, ideally, overnight.
We then preheat the oven to 180 ° C, we bake for 5 min, we lower heat to 170 o and we continue baking for another 45-55 min. The custard should be nicely golden -brown on top but not burnt. We let it cool and then we store it in the fridge until it chills completely (at least 4 hours), so that the custard settles and aquires its ideal consistency. Better, bring it back to room temperature, before enjoying.
NOTE: See how to make your own short crust – brisèe dough qui
NOTE 2: See how to make your own pastry cream qui
NOTE 3: For a detailed guide on how to line the tart shell and how to partially blind bake it qui
