pastry cream

It’s coming up to that dreaded Christmas time, when we have to think about doing all those extra chores, buying presents, making Christmas cake (oh, tick,) Christmas mince pies and of course going to all those Christmas parties and lunches.  It can be quite stressful all this extra multitasking on top of our busy lives.  I’m taking the approach to try and do a little bit at time, tick off those present buying obligations while I’m already out doing something else, make the most of the sales.  It does take the pressure off.  It seems to be my philosophy in life actually, drip feed things to make them happen.  It’s how I aspire to write a novel too, 750 words a day, that’s 2500/week, 10,000/month and a novel in a year!  It’s amazing what you can achieve by drip feeding, anything, tidying the cupboards, reading, any thing you think you don’t have time for, you can do if you do a little bit a day.  Well this bake didn’t go exactly like that.  It sat on the bench unbaked for about 5 days, (while I drip-fed other things!) and by the time I went to bake, I had run out of eggs, usual story.  But I did it finally last night around dinner time which might not have been a sensible time to bake but it seems to be the story lately.  I prepared the pâte brisée, (which is just a fancy word for pastry) in a way I had never seen before, by (more…)