Bake-a-Long Week 2! Custard Creams!

The Bake Off Bake Along continues! 

Alright, so this week was actually Bread Week, and I've fallen behind with my bake along already... but in my defence my Custard Cream stamp didn't arrive until the Monday of Bread Week, so what was I supposed to do! 

As soon as my stamp arrived I leapt straight into action, channeling the spirit of Biscuit Week! As ever, the bakers faced three challenges, which also meant three potential bakes for me to choose from! The signature challenge was a marshmallow biscuit, the technical challenge was these Custard Creams, and the showstopper was an illusion biscuit spectacular! 



Once again, time and space were against me, which ruled out the showstopper, and I've made marshmallow before, so I decided to go for the Custard Cream technical, as I've never attempted crème au beurre, also known as French buttercream, before!

Even the method for preparing the biscuit dough was a little different to what I'm used to. To start, butter and sugar are creamed together with an electric whisk or in a stand mixer until pale and fluffy. Vanilla paste and egg are then added, before flour and custard powder are gently mixed in with your bare hands to form a very soft dough that is quite difficult to handle.


After chilling in the fridge for at least an hour, the dough is rolled out to roughly 3 millimetres, cut out into rectangles and stamped with the iconic Custard Cream design! The key to maintaining the definition on the design is to chill the biscuits well before baking. I did okay with chilling the dough, but the stamp was so hard to use and the dough kept sticking to it, tearing the biscuits and meaning I had to keep starting again with the rolling process. 

Once stamped, chilled and baked, it was time to make the crème au beurre! It's not an exaggeration to say it took me 5 attempts at this buttercream to get it right! It sounds simple, but I think I was just rushing. Egg yolks are whisked in a bowl with an electric whisk or in a stand mixer until a little paler, before a sugar syrup heated to 115 degrees C is whisked in until the mixture cools back to room temperature and leaves a thick ribbon when the whisk is removed. In my previous attempts I think I was overheated the sugar, and as soon as it hit the egg yolks in the bowl it crystallised before I had the chance to do anything. Custard powder is mixed in, before butter is gradually whisked into the cooled egg mixture to create a smooth buttercream.

To finish, a generous layer of the crème au beurre is piped onto one of the biscuits, before being sandwiched with another biscuit! And that's it!  

The taste of these Custard Creams was absolutely insane, and I eventually cracked the crème au beurre, but the definition on the patterns wasn't as profound as I'd hoped for, and some of the biscuits were a little overbaked... So, a bit of a mixed bag with this one... 

Bring on the Bread Week challenge! 

Gibby x   

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