Raspberry Mille Feuille

by Jessica Nguyen

 

A triple decker dream with layers of puff pastry, custard and topped with fresh raspberries. You can make the components the day before or ahead of time and simply assemble just before serving.

Makes- 4 individual serves of mille feuille, plus two extra puff pastry rectangles as back up.

Ingredients- 8

Cooking Time- 1 hour, excluding overnight chilling time for the custard

Skill Level- Medium- delicate piping and assembling required 



Ingredients


Puff Pastry

  • 1 box (375g, 1 x 27cm x 36cm ready rolled sheet) of Careme frozen puff pastry, thawed. Please note, I’ve based my recipe on using a whole sheet of this so if you end up using another brand (most supermarket puff pastry brands come as squares) know that the dimensions of your mille feuille might be a bit different. I highly recommend using this brand where possible as it’s the best quality, but this recipe can still work with any other frozen puff pastry.

Custard



Topping

  • 1 punnet 200g of fresh raspberries

Equipment-

  • Two sheet pans- ideally the same size that can nest on top of eachother and ideally with a wire rack that you can assemble the vanilla slice on later. I use these sheet pans with a wire rack for this recipe.
  • Baking paper
  • Whisk
  • Silicone spatula
  • Mixing bowls
  • Pot

Method


Baking the Puff Pastry

  1. Preheat your oven to 190 degrees celsius fan forced.
  2. Roll out your puff pastry sheet onto a chopping board and use a ruler and knife to cut the sheet in half lengthways and then cutting down in 5.5cm widths so you end up with 14 rectangles that are 5.5cm x 13.5cm in size. 
  3. Line one of your sheet pans with baking paper and carefully place the rectangles onto the pan, allowing a small gap around the edges of each sheet. Place another sheet of baking paper over the top of the puff pastry and cover with the other sheet pan. Your puff pastry should be in between a layer of baking paper and the two sheet pans. 
  4. You can also place a heavy oven safe baking dish on top of the sheet pans to weigh down the puff pastry as it will puff and push the top sheet pan up as it cooks.
  5. Place into your oven and bake for at least 30 minutes until golden brown and crispy. I check mine at the 20 minute mark to make sure it’s cooking evenly and some times flip the tray around if one end is browning faster to even it out.
  6. Remove from the oven and gently place the pastry on wire racks to cool completely. Allow at least 30 minutes for cooling.

Making The Custard

  1. I normally make the custard whilst the pastry is baking, so then both can cool and chill at the same time.
  2. Pour the milk into a pot and gently heat on low. Spilt your vanilla bean pod and scrape out as much of the vanilla bean as possible and add to the milk. Throw the pod into the milk too and heat on medium until hot and just about to boil. Be careful not to over heat the milk. Remove from the heat.
  3. Whilst the milk is heating, place the egg yolks into a bowl and whisk to combine. 
  4. Add the caster sugar and corn flour and whisk until creamy and pale.
  5. Ladle in a small spoonful of milk through a wire strainer into the egg mixture and quickly whisk to combine. Adding a small amount of hot milk at the start tempers the eggs so you avoid curdling and cooking them. Slowly add in the remaining milk over a strainer and whisk to combine. 
  6. Pour the mixture back into the same pot that your milk was in, making sure there’s no vanilla pod bits still in the pot. 
  7. Heat on medium for 3-5 minutes whilst continuously whisking until the custard thickens and bubbles. You can also use a silicone spatula to scrape the bottom and corners of the pot as those parts are the most prone to burning the custard and creating clumps. 
  8. Add the butter and whisk to dissolve and combine. Remove from the heat and continue whisking for another minute to avoid any clumps.
  9. Transfer to a heat proof bowl and allow to cool completely in the fridge. Allow 1-2 hours but if you need it in a hurry, I sometimes throw it into the freezer and it’s ready in about 30 minutes. It’s ready to use when the custard has thickened even more and is completely cool.

Assembling the Mille Feuille

  1. Take the custard out of the fridge and give it another whisk to remove any lumps and clumps during cooling. The custard should be thick but smooth. Place into a piping bag with a round nozzle.
  2. Place one of your pastry rectangles onto a chopping board or directly onto a plate. This is the base.
  3. Pipe 10 small dollops (2 x 5) of custard down the rectangle puff pastry sheet.
  4. Gently place another puff pastry sheet on top of the custard and gently push down slightly to create a sandwich.
  5. Repeat and pipe another 10 dollops of custard on top of the second puff pastry sheet again.
  6. Take another rectangle piece of pastry and spread a few teaspoons worth of custard along the top/ This helps the raspberries to stick to the top.
  7. Then top with raspberries. You should be able to fit 2 raspberries wide and end uo with 10-12 raspberries on top in total depending on the size of your raspberries. 
  8. Use an offset spatula to gently transfer the mille feuille to a plate. Otherwise if you assembled it on a plate in the begin, serve immediately and enjoy.

 

Watch the Process

 

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