Comments on: Pastéis de nata — Portuguese custard tarts

By: Azelia

Azelia — Fri, 22 May 2009 14:41:49 +0000

Hi Duncan
I Came across your website during research on the 'pasteis de nata' or the Portuguese custard tart and found you actually knew what you're talking about, which makes a refreshing change from so many others. (I should know being Portuguese)

Please continue with detail and depth on your chosen recipes as not only does it gives us an interesting read but shows respect for the chosen ingredients.

By: Duncan

Duncan — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 12:28:16 +0000

@Jan: I'm glad you found a solution which worked for you. It's all about the individual's goals. In my case, I wouldn't be happy with the solution you found if my goal were to reproduce a close-to-authentic product. But as always, as long is the cooks and/or the guests are happy with their result, it's positive.

By: Jan

Jan — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 01:45:44 +0000

Hi there,

Well I am normally the type of cook who likes to fiddle about with things… unless I'm in a hurry! So I'm sorry to say, Duncan, that I have sinned against your lovely fiddly recipe and taken some SERIOUS shotcuts! (With quite pleasing results, actually!)

Last night I had about 500 mL of bought custard that was nearly at it's due date, and a morning tea to go to the next day. So, I turned to the source of all answers – the net, as I was wondering if it is possible to make custard tarts with store bought custard AND store bought puff pastry. I came across your site and almost gave up on the idea, until I read about Sam's experiments with the bought puff pastry.

So, thanks to Sam, I decided to take the convenience thing one step further and give it a go. I preheated the oven to 230C, added in to my store bought custard the 22g of flour and an egg for good measure, put circles of store bought pamapas puff pastry into my non stick pans and added in a good measure of custard.

The result? After 15 minutes out came these glorious custard tarts (I won't call them patsteis de nata!) complete with brown spots!!

I was quite chuffed! So for all you home cooks who are more into reading Super Food Ideas than the foodies' Delicious magazine… here's one for you!!

) Btw… they were a hit at the morning tea today, too. All gone within 15 minutes of putting them out. Gotta love it!

By: Sam

Sam — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 14:52:07 +0000

Oops, it's me again. Have now sucessfully made a batch of delicious pasteis de nata from your recipe. You were right. Don't mess about with blind baking – not even with a domestic oven! My fan oven goes up to 230C, and it took 15 mins in all to bake. The odd brown spots make an appearance. Don't mess about with a blow torch to fake the spots, boys and girls. That was horrid.

The next challenge was making my own puff pastry. My goodness, that was a chanllenge! If people aren't bored with my blabbering will write some more about that.

Thank you for your recipe. Saves a lot of hard work for the rest of us.

By: Sam

Sam — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 21:24:05 +0000

Hello Duncan
If you ever visit Bangkok pls check out Kanom bakery in Siam Square :
(http://www.ka-nom.com/producthome.html). It's the 1st and only shop and sells decent Portuguese custard tart in Thailand. Since their opening a lot of imperonators emerged. None could match. It is their puff pastry that makes them special. The founder went on holiday in Hong Kong and saw a bakery selling Portuguese style tart (not Chinese ones), with queues spilling into the street. She ate the tart there and was hooked – enough to pay millions of Baht to find out the know-how and opened a bakery in Thailand. It was a hit!

By: Duncan

Duncan — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 01:07:20 +0000

Thanks for the feedback Sam. I definitely can't see blind-baking being a success — the pastry can normally cook properly within the time needed for the custard, subject to oven conditions, so the real prob remaining is just that of getting the custard to get burnt spots without actually curdling. Love to hear more if you do more experiments.

By: Sam

Sam — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:48:40 +0000

Made your custard and Leite's, but used bought puff pastry for both. Yours has a nice amount of sugar. I think Leite's was too sweet, but more intensely yellow (before being cooked). Having baked both in one batch and couldn't tell the difference between the two by appearance when they came out. I saw a recipe that suggests blind baking the pastry first. Seemed the right way to go for domestic ovens but the pastry became overcooked and hard! The custard, was just right though. More experiments later. Thank you….

By: Cecília

Cecília — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:03:01 +0000

As soon as I find my recipe. I'll send it to you, so you can give it a try! Who knows?

By: Duncan

Duncan — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 01:47:00 +0000

Bemvindo, Cecília! It's interesting what you say about the syrup — the recipes I've tried with syrup haven't given a better result, so I haven't used them any further. Perhaps a professional oven reveals a difference.

I haven't tried the recipe in the video, but certainly a number of similar ones.

By: Cecília

Cecília — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 20:52:36 +0000

Hi! Cecília from Portugal

In fact the way they made this in the video, with the syrup, is the way to make them also in Portugal, for the professional bakers. I own a bakery Shop and I tried several recipes de Pastéis de Nata and the best were made with the syrup. The most difficult, however is to bake them, due to the high temperature needed.
Have you tried the brazilian way?