Ingredients
3 egg yolks
125g caster sugar (brush your teeth for even longer today, this is a sweet one!)
30g cornflour
1 vanilla pod (split it and get all the seeds out. Yes it looks like a twig but trust us, it's so tasty!)
175ml whole Isle of Moo milk (blue carton, the creamy good stuff!)
225ml double cream (also creamy as, well, it's cream)
300g ready-rolled puff pastry
Plain flour, for dusting (hoffman)
IOM Creamery butter, for greasing
Icing sugar, for dusting
12 hole muffin tray (not to eat though, obviously... well, you could give it a go. But we don't recommend it)
Method
Have you ever had a Portuguese tart? Well, these Port-Moo-Guese tarts are almost exactly the same and just as delicious. The only difference? Throw in some Manx produce and a shocking cow pun and here we are...
First up, you're going to need to preheat your oven to 180C. And fetch your butter. You can get your hands dirty here - grease the wells of your muffin tray.
In a pan, heat the yolks, sugar and cornflour over a low to medium heat. Make sure you're whisking continuously until it's a thick mixture.
Add your vanilla seeds (aka scooped out twig flesh), then also add milk and cream slowly, whisking as you do so. The mix should become thick - like creamy, not stupid. This is a very intelligent mixture.
Stir the Mensa IQ custard mix until it reaches the boil. You can then remove it from the heat and cover with cling film. This ensures a skin doesn't form on the custard, rather like a deliciously tasty snake.
Dust your work surface with icing sugar and flour, then roll out your puff pastry. Now, this part is a little tricky so make sure Mum or Dad really pay attention to this recipe, ok? You're calling the shots here, chef! Cut the rolled out pastry in half and place one sheet on top of the other. It's a pastry sandwich! Next up, roll it all out like a Swiss Roll and cut it into twelve slices. Yes, twelve is very specific. But trust us!
Lay each of the rolled pastry slices onto your work surface and roll out into 10cm discs using a rolling pin. 10cm is about the size of a doughnut. Mmmmm, doughnuts.
This is the fun part! Press a pastry disc into each of the wells in your muffin tray, and divided the cooled custard equally into the pastry cases.
Transfer the muffin tray to your pre-heated, hot oven and bake for 18-20 minutes. You should see set, golden-brown custard and a pastry so crisp, it sounds like walking on autumn leaves.
Allow your tarts to cool in the tin and then? Devour them and salute our Portuguese brothers and sisters! Or should we say, Port-Moo-Guese? Probably not but we just did.
