My granddaughter, Lillian, was at my house this week, so I decided to make Vanilla Custard Pudding again, partly because Lillian loves to stir, and this pudding takes LOTS of stirring, but also because I had an idea I wanted to try. I have been bothered by the large amount of flour clumps in my cooked pudding that I have to strain out...here is my old picture from the first posting once again:
My theory was that the undissolved flour possibly makes the finished pudding less "stiff." Even though it is no trouble to strain the lumps out, I still don't like the idea of so much unused flour. I recall that when I make other sauces and gravies, I sometimes shake the flour with a small amount of liquid to dissolve it before cooking.
So instead of putting my 1/3 cup flour in the pot and adding the milk, as the recipe says...I put it in a covered container then added about 1/2 cup or so of my measured amount of 4 cups of milk.
I put the lid on and shook the container vigorously and the flour quickly dissolved. Then I poured this into my pot with all the rest of the ingredients to cook, following the recipe from here on. I hardly had to whisk at all to blend things together. Lillian and I took turns stirring (while relaxing, of course...). When the custard thickened, I strained it to see the difference; there was hardly a thing in the strainer...maybe a little bit of undissolved egg white is all. So clearly this is the best way to make creamy vanilla custard!
One last thought...I notice every time I make this, that there comes a point when I decide I am tired of stirring and this is not relaxing or fun any more--that I have other things I need to go do--and every time, just at that point, the custard comes to a boil and thickens and it is all over! So don't get discouraged at all the stirring; there is an end to it just when you have had enough!
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