Valli Valli
BOILED CUSTARD
1 pint hot milk Yolks 3 eggs 1/4 cup sugar ⅛ teaspoon salt ½ teaspoon vanilla or orange Beat the eggs a little; add sugar and salt and then the hot milk, stirring constantly. Cook in a double boiler until mixture thickens and a coating forms on the spoon, stirring all the time. Strain, cool and flavor. Should the custard curdle beat with a dover egg-beater until smooth.
Sincerely yours,
A plain stirred custard of the sort that served as sauce, pudding base and invalid food alike. The whole thing hinges on heat control: this is a sauce thickened by egg yolk, not by starch, so it must never reach a boil.
- Salt quantityThe salt is printed as "18 teaspoon," which is a broken 1/8 teaspoon. Anything from a pinch to 1/8 teaspoon is right for a pint of milk.
- Target temperatureYolks thicken between about 170 and 180F and scramble above roughly 185F. A thermometer removes the guesswork; pull the custard the moment it coats the back of a spoon and leaves a clear track when you draw a finger through.
- The double boilerKeep the water below the top pan simmering, not boiling hard, and do not let the pan bottom touch the water. Direct heat works if you stir without pause, but the margin for error is very small.
- Adding the hot milkPour the hot milk into the yolks in a slow stream while whisking, rather than the reverse. This raises the egg temperature gradually and is the main defence against curdling.
- A dover egg-beaterA hand-crank rotary beater; "Dover" was used loosely enough in American cookbooks of the period to stand for rotary beaters generally. A whisk, an immersion blender or a quick pass through a sieve will rescue a slightly curdled custard just as well; a badly scrambled one will not come back.
- Flavouring after coolingFlavouring extracts are volatile and usually alcohol-based (the "orange" here may be extract, or rind or juice). Adding the flavouring off the heat, as directed, keeps it from steaming away.
- CoolingStrain into a cold bowl at once and stir occasionally as it cools, or set the bowl in ice water. Residual heat in the pan will keep cooking the eggs. Refrigerate and use within two or three days.
- YieldAbout 2 1/2 cups: four small servings on its own, or enough sauce for a pudding, a fruit compote or a trifle for six.
Boiled custard is a misnomer that survived in American cookbooks for well over a century: the name distinguishes the stirred, pourable custard cooked on the stove from the baked custard set in a dish in the oven, and writers went on using the phrase even while cautioning against an actual boil. It belongs to the same family as English pouring custard and French creme anglaise -- sauce for stewed fruit, steamed puddings and trifle. It appears here in a collection of recipes contributed by stage performers, and boiled custard was also common sickroom fare, gentle enough for a strained voice or an unsettled stomach. Valli Valli was an English-born singer and actress who worked in musical comedy and early film in the years around the First World War.