Vanilla Custard

I have a serious love for all things cool, smooth, creamy, melt in your mouth deliciousness, pudding, custard, vanilla custard, custard with farm fresh peaches, custard with whipped cream AND peaches. Did I mention custard yet? I recently drove past a local farmer's orchard advertising peaches for sale so of course I stopped. The smell alone was enough to convince me. Thankfully, the drive home was short lest I be tempted to consume my juicy goodness before I could prepare my dessert. Arriving home I began searching through different recipes and agree with the title in the Luna Cafe's http://thelunacafe.com/ultimate-vanilla-pudding-perfect-stove-top-custard/ "Ultimate vanilla pudding perfect stove top custard". The result? Simply, the ultimate custard! The trick to smooth custard? Stir quickly and often to ensure no lumps form. I let my custard set overnight in an 8x8 inch glass pan with a piece of plastic wrap over the surface of the dessert. To serve, spoon custard in individual dishes, top with fresh peaches and dollop with plenty of whipped cream. Enjoy!

Thank you again to Luna Cafe for the wonderful recipe! 

3 large egg yolks
9 table­spoons sugar
3 table­spoon corn­starch
3/8 tea­spoon salt
3 cups milk 

3 table­spoons unsalted but­ter, room tem­per­a­ture, cut into 12 chunks
1½ tea­spoon vanilla 

1. In a small bowl, whisk egg yolks with ¼ cup of milk until well com­bined. Reserve.
2. In a 3-quart saucepan, whisk together sugar, corn­starch, and salt, and then slowly whisk in the cold milk, a lit­tle at a time to ensure no lumps form. Scrape the bot­tom and sides of the saucepan with a sil­i­con (heat­proof) spatula.
3. Over medium heat, stir­ring con­stantly, bring to a bare simmer.
4. Ladle ½ cup of the hot pud­ding into the egg yolks and whisk rapidly. Repeat two times. Now add the egg yolk mix­ture back to the saucepan. This tem­pers the egg and helps to pre­vent curdling.
5. Lower the heat to medium-low and con­tinue stir­ring the pud­ding until it thick­ens to the point that it coats the back of the spat­ula, from 2–4 minutes.
6. Remove from the heat and stir in the but­ter and vanilla until the but­ter is melted.
7. Imme­di­ately pour the pud­ding into a medium mix­ing bowl or 4-cup glass mea­sur­ing cup. (If you think you may have lumps, pour the pud­ding through a sin­gle mesh strainer, using a plas­tic spat­ula to push the pud­ding through.) Alter­na­tively, you can pour pud­ding directly into six ½-cup serv­ing dishes. (The rea­son I rarely do this is because I pre­fer mounded servings.)
8. Quickly press a small piece of plas­tic wrap directly on the sur­face of the pud­ding to pre­vent a skin from forming.
9. Let cool, and then refrig­er­ate until chilled, at least 2 hours.
10. To serve, spoon pud­ding into six, ½-cup ramekins (if you didn’t do this earlier).
11. Top each serv­ing with a gen­er­ous mound of whipped cream.
12. Serve imme­di­ately.

Makes about 3 cups, or six ½-cup servings.