You can’t make a custard without breaking eggs
All these years I thought, or assumed without thinking about it much, that “custard powder/instant custard” was actually custard in powder form. Today I learned otherwise. I saw this –
Those two packets above the porridge oats are custard powder. Even though we were told to ignore the custard, I became curious about how much protein was actually in the custard powder, figuring it was not much. (There’s been some chat about Monroe’s food advice over the past couple of days, and she does seem to me to have some odd ideas, or at least say odd things, like that oats and mushrooms are good sources of protein.) SO I looked it up, and was mildly shocked to find that the stuff never sees an egg, not even a tiny fraction of an egg. Eggs have nothing to do with it. But but but, said I, in all my bumpkin ignorance, how can they call it custard when zero egg? I have no idea, but they do.
Custard powder and instant custard powder are the generic product names for similar and competing products. The product is a powder, based on cornflour, which thickens to form a custard-like sauce when mixed with milk and heated.
Cornflour and milk (and lots of sugar, I’m betting). Paste, basically. Not food.
I must disagree. ‘Paste’ is the Italian pasta, the food invented by the Romans, who went on to create the Empire that stretched from Scotland to India, bringing light into heathen darkness and spaghetti bolognaise into the hordes of both martial and heathen stomachs; that the Roman Army was marching on.
And I, in turn, must disagree with Omar. The tomatoes essential to a bolognese sauce did not arrive in Italy from the New World until 1000 years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
So it is in effect identical to instant pudding? Explains why it looks the same…
Yeah, custard powder might as well be wallpaper paste. I hated custard because that’s all we ever got. The first time someone made me a custard using egg and cream was a true revelation.
Oh, and tomatos…
https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/tomato-italy-history/index.html
Sorry, I kept thinking of this. Mushrooms (typical whites) are around 3% protein. Not terrible, but at a 100g serve would only make up 6% of the recommended daily intake. Similarly, most oats are around 2.5%.Better than nothing, but not really a primary protein source.
The odd one is that custard, which is the Asda Instant Custard (https://groceries.asda.com/product/custard/asda-instant-custard/1000265255191). It lists the main ingredient as Whey Powder, which should be a mix of whey protein and lactose. The powder is mixed with hot water and Asda make no claim to even trace levels of protein. None! Which does make me wonder about the whey powder they use. There should be around 20-30% whey protein in there (rest being lactose), and if whey powder is the main ingredient, they should be getting a few % protein. Something’s a bit iffy there.
In the original photo, the chickpeas are the best protein source, with minor supplements from the corn chips, bread, oats, mushrooms, dairy products etc.
Not 0 protein, but nowhere near enough protein in that for two adults and a growing teen for a week.
@#2: Could have used large olives instead, and served the dish up in dim light and after sundown, with plenty of wine for starters. Coconuts even, or some other palm seed from along the Nile. Could even have discovered the New Worlld in their quest for ingredients for spaghetti bolognaise 1,000 years before Columbus. Never mind the legendary gold. Where there’s a will, there’s always a way. ;-)
^ Are you suggesting a spag bol with olives filling in for tomatoes? Aaaand now I’m vomiting. Thanks.
When we were in Spain for our honeymoon, one of the tapas we were served was a single large olive, almost the size of a hardball. It was delicious – dare I say sweet? That’s when I realized they keep the good ones for themselves and send us the rest.
Well I have to show my British-colonial origins by sticking up for custard powder. It’s a sweet, milky, thick liquid which is very comforting – I eat it when I have a cold or some other minor illness.
No, it doesn’t taste like proper baked custard. And I don’t think there would be much protein in it.
Custard powder was, I believe, invented (C19?) by some guy whose wife liked custard but was allergic to eggs, so he came up with a flavoured, cornflour-based substitute.
Instant custard is OK on a rhubarb crumble or Christmas pud. Not a patch on the real thing (I’d never even think of using it in a pastel de nata), but it’s quick, convenient and at least you’re not left wondering what to do with all those egg whites.
As a fruitcake topping it’s not bad at all, though doesn’t really hold a candle to creme anglaise or brandy butter.
Nobody but a Brit would even consider eating custard substitute. It’s just weird. Custard all over everything and it isn’t even really custard. Yuck.
There’s a simple solution: anything you would bake with custard, make real custard. Anything you would just pour custard over the top of, use ice cream instead. It’s better.
Unless it’s a boiled pudding, in which case… close your eyes and think of England.
I say why bother with pudding or custard or anything else that looks like it came out of a Gerber jar when there are endless alternatives. Something I never learned to enjoy I reckon.
Puddings are by definition steamed, not boiled. :-P
(my wife insists that puddings are not steamed, but is a chocolate flavoured sauce with a custard-like consistency, but I can’t countenance the idea of a chocolate flavoured steak and kidney pudding; come to think of it – she also uses pudding as an uncountable noun, which is unfathomably weird :-) )
Correct usage: One pudding; two puddings.
See I knew about custard in a jug (or what Yanks would call a pitcher) poured over whatever turns up for the sweet (what Yanks would call dessert), but all this time I assumed it had at least some egg in it. I can’t remember if I ever actually tried it.
Having been totally put off
wallpaper pastecustard as a kid, I had to look up this baked custard you all talk about. Isn’t that just a way of ruining a perfectly good soft egg and cream custard?Putting aside what has been an interesting food. diversion, I think the main point really is that Jack Munroe is being really snarky about the comment re “0 protein” unjustifiably, because his shopping cart has woefully too little protein in it for three people. It’s not the worst diet I’ve seen, but it’s not the best either.
Noooooooooo – there are two kinds of custard and they’re both delicious. And there’s a kind with a caramel? or brown sugar? syrup on the bottom that you flip when you serve it so there’s nice runny sauce trickling down the lovely smooth bowl-shaped [baked] custard. Also custard pie is good. They don’t compete with each other, they’re both good.
See? Do admit.
Shan’t! At a meal out I’m always the one at the table who doesn’t order creme brûlée. I’ll accept that as a character flaw, or misguided, or whatever, but it’s my true nature. Maybe I’m just trans dessert or something.
Ah well that’s all right. I just wanted to assure you it’s not objectively disgusting, is all.
I’m not certain that the Romans had pasta (noodles) either. The history I learned, which admittedly could be erroneous, was that noodles/pasta were introduced to Italy in the 1400s, when Marco Polo returned from his travels to China, and brought noodles back with him.
Everyone is going on about custard and I’m doing the Homer Simpson drool about bolognese. Always the odd one out.
@#23:
But a 2-way trade in goods ideas and information was happening along what became known as the Silk Road for a long time before Marco Polo (1254 C.E. –1324 C.E.). According to the following site, it commenced with the Han Dynasty in 130 BC. See https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/silk-road
Oh, you mean flan?
Si. Oui. Ja. It’s funny what a lot of names there are for it. I’m not even sure what it’s called in USian – it was a dessert in my family when I was a child but I don’t remember what we called it.
I’m with you catwhisperer, savoury every time.
I have eaten Flan in Flåm. That amused me.
(In South Florida it’s generally known as Flan; I think the French have another name for it..)
Crème caramel?