A Recipe from seven sisters spices

PLUM TOPPED CUSTARD TART

Illustration by Kat Heyes

Chloe Edwards established Seven Sisters’ Spices in 2104 while she was on extended leave from work to care for her young daughter, who has since fully recovered from Non Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Cooking provided both a form of control when the medics had principal care for her daughters health, and a vital soothing balm during a very stressful time. Since then, Seven Sisters’ Spices has grown from Chloe’s kitchen table to its own premises on Farley Farm in Muddles Green, East Sussex, once home to Lee Miller. Chloe caters for private events, including a number of Sideline’s photoshoots, teaches her own cookery workshops, has a range of spiced larder products and writes about food.

With Milestones as a theme, Chloe went instinctively to a celebratory sweet treat and this custard based plum tart. While the recipe here calls for plums with a custard flavoured with bay, lemon and cinnamon, you can top the tart with any fruit that is in season, perhaps changing the flavour notes in the custard if you like – vanilla custard with apricots, cinnamon and clove custard with apple or orange and saffron custard with pears, or indeed any flavour combinations that you know you like. This tart is delicious served hot or cold, and perfect for celebrating your own milestones.

Ingredients

• 250ml full fat milk

• 20g corn flour

• 30g Plain White Flour

• 250g Caster Sugar

• 125ml Water

• 1 Stick of Cinnamon

• 2 bay leaves

• 4 Slices of Fresh Lemon

• 3 Egg Yolks & 1 Whole Egg

• 50g Butter, Melted

• 1 packet of filo pastry

• 1 tablespoon of demerara sugar mixed with a teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method

Heat the milk in a large saucepan till it is just about to simmer, remove from the heat. In a large bowl mix together the flours with a whisk and add the hot milk a ladle full at a time, whisking between each addition to make a smooth paste, careful not to make any lumps. Once all of the milk is added return the mixture to the saucepan and put over a medium heat, stirring constantly until thickened enough that the whisk leaves a trail behind it,

Put the sugar, cinnamon, bay, lemon & water in a saucepan, stir over a low heat until the sugar has dissolved and then bring to a rolling simmer - cook like this for 5 minutes.

Take both pans off the heat and gradually whisk the sugar syrup into the thickened milk until it is all combined, discarding the lemon, cinnamon and bay as you go. Next add the egg yolks and whole egg, whisking well all the time so the eggs don’t cook in the hot mixture.

Return the custard to the heat and stir constantly until the mixture has thickened back up enough for the spoon to leave a temporary valley in the custard when you stir it. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool – if you are short on time transfer the hot custard into a large shallow bowl and stir occasionally to speed up the cooling process.

Prepare your fruit by washing, drying and then halving the plums, de-stoning as you go.

Pre heat your oven to 180c – 160c fan.

Next to the pie construction - Open your filo pastry and lay the whole packet of sheets on the work surface - it is best to work with filo in a pile like this as it is very thin and prone to dry out if you work with one sheet at a time.

First you want to make a square that will nearly fill the cake tin - this will serve to re-enforce the base of your pie. To make a square to fit the base, brush melted butter over the centre of the top sheet, fold the bottom third and top third of the pastry over and on top of the buttered square, brush the new surface with more butter and fold the two sides in to make a square. Put this to one side for now. Don’t worry if it is not perfect, filo pastry is very forgiving!

Brush the inside of the cake tin with butter, base and sides, and lay a sheet of pastry across it so that equal amounts of pastry fall to either side of the tin. Gently press the pastry sheet into the tin, so that it lines it snuggly. Lightly butter the circle of pastry covering the base of the tin and add another layer of pastry, at right angles to the first. Repeat the process of gently pressing the pastry into the tin and lightly buttering the base. Now you want to add the square you made. Once in place, lightly butter it and add another 2 layers of pastry. You should end up with a fully lined flan tin with pastry ‘petals’ all the way around the circumference.

Take your cooled custard and pour it into the pastry lined flan tin, making sure it is evenly dispersed. Next top the custard with the fruit, I like to arrange my fruit in ordered circles, but you can top it in any way you like, it doesn’t have to be this neat and tidy.

Once the fruit is as you like it, sprinkle with the sugar and cinnamon mixture before gently folding over the loose edges of filo pastry, tucking them over the fruit. Filo can come in various sizes, if you have a lot of pastry hanging over the edge, scrunch it gently so that it doesn’t cover up too much of the fruit.

Use the remaining melted butter to brush this pastry cuff, this will help it brown as it bakes, and bake in the oven for 30-40 minutes until the pastry has browned, the fruit is soft and the custard is piping hot. Serve hot from the oven, warm or cold from the fridge, depending on your preference.