Cooking with Alicia & Annie--Low-Fat Baked Vanilla Custard

“Chopsticks are one of the reasons the Chinese never invented custard”

Its' cooking with Alicia and Annie, again. The November blog event '08. This time the recipe is from Alicia's recipes.
Holiday season alongwith the warmth and good cheer brings with it oodles of weight, when we throw caution to the winds. So this time I decided to take preventive measures and make desserts that could be dug into without the guilt.
As we both love custard and puddings. I decided to give this custard a shot...and I must say it tasted so sweet, may be because I made it from scratch. ;-)

Its the Low Fat dessert recipe for Vanilla Custard.

Low -Fat Baked Vanilla Custard

Ingredients-
1/2 quart 2% milk (low fat milk)
3 eggs
3/4 cup Equal sweetener/any sugar substitue
2 teaspoons vanilla
a pinch of salt

Method-
On medium flame, heat the milk in deep pan till boiling.
Let cool for 5 mins.
In a separate bowl beat the eggs, sugar substitute,salt and vanilla essence untill smooth.
Now pour this mixture in the still warm milk, slowly. Mixing it all the while.
Pour this custard in a mould/casserole.
Place this casserole in microwave-safe bowl with a little hot water.
Also, place a cup of water in the microwave. Bake for 15 minutes on medium setting.

Check if sharp knife inserted halfway between center and edge of custard comes out clean. Remove custard mould or casserole from the bowl of hot water. Cool to room temperature. Refrigerate several hours or until well chilled.
Serve garnished with sliced fresh fruits or as desired.I used cookies and raisins.
YUM YUM YUM....

Proof in the pudding.....

"A wise woman puts a grain of sugar into everything she says to a man,and takes a grain of salt with everything he says to her."

----Helen Rowland.

I don't know whether others (like me) have suffered what I like to call the "sugar-magnet" craving.
As a child I sometimes craved for sweets all of a sudden...anything..even plain sugar would do. Unfortunately this has stuck with me over the years. The only thing that has changed is that now plain sugar wouldn't do! A few days back this craving struck, without any warning ....and yours truly had to make 'some' (read 'lots' of) dessert.

I made Fruit Custard (another of my husband's eternal favourites) , to try and keep my dessert a little on the healthier side. ;-) Also, because its so quick!
My earliest memories of custard are when returning after school,we (my bro and me) sneaked into the refrigerator to see if there is something sweet that mom had made...bread pudding, choco-biscuit cake, shahi tukde, sandesh or custard. We secretly smiled at each-other like partners-in-crime,when we saw our sweet-treasures. And even before mom could serve it up for us...we would have attacked the fridge and left only morsels..lol. Mom obviously knew about our sneaking...so she religiously kept some dessert. Well dessert for us kids was not confined to the after meal pleasure, it could be had at anytime during the day-breakfast, lunch, dinner or even in tiffin. lol.

I will do the same for my kids eventually, but for now I'm making my hubby happy..and not to forget myself too! :-)

Vanilla Mixed Fruit Custard--
Ingredients-
2 tbsp custard powder ( I used Brown & Polson, you can use your favourite brand)
3 tbsp packed brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
3 cup skimmed milk
favorite fruits, chopped (banana,mango,strawberry,orange,grapes,gooseberry,pear,apple)

Method-
Heat the milk (leaving 1/2 cup aside) on medium flame, with the brown sugar.
To the half cup milk add the custard powder and mix till lump free.
Now, add this mix to the boiling milk. Remove from heat. Add vanilla essence.
Pour in a separate bowl and refrigerate till cool.

Serve chilled with freshly chopped fruits ( in my case I added the Ritters' Sport Dunkle Voll-Nuss chocolate too !!).