Vanilla Millefeuilles
Serves six
600 g puff pastry (ready to roll out from the supermarket)
FOR THE CRÈME PATISSIERE:
500 ml milk
1 bourbon vanilla pod
5 egg yolks
90 g sugar
70 g type 550 flour
2 teaspoons icing sugar
250 ml whipping cream
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 170°C. Roll out the puff pastry to a thickness of 1 cm and place on a baking tray. Cover with another baking tray and top with evenly distributed weights to prevent the dough from rising too much. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes. Set aside.
Prepare the crème pâtissière. Heat the milk in a pan with the vanilla pod, which has been cut open and scraped out. In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar until they turn white, then sieve in the flour and mix. Dilute with a ladle of hot milk and pour into the pan. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes without stirring. Leave the crème pâtissière to cool, stirring regularly to prevent a skin from forming on top. Set aside in the fridge.
Preheat the oven grill. Dust the puff pastry with icing sugar, using a sieve to obtain a thin, even layer.
Place the baking tray under the oven grill, taking care not to burn the sugar. Leave to cool, then sprinkle with another layer of icing sugar and place back under the grill. Repeat this process a third time so that the dough is well-caramelised.
Whip the cream until stiff and fold into the crème pâtissière. Cut 18 even rectangles out of the puff pastry and assemble the millefeuilles: cover one rectangle completely with small dots of the cream using a piping bag, cover with another pastry rectangle, then repeat the process and finish with a pastry rectangle. Sprinkle the millefeuilles with icing sugar just before serving.