Month: November 2024

Portuguese Custard Tarts

~ nancyruth ~ 5 Comments

The soft food diet my doctor’s office gave me included “cream-filled pie” as an acceptable dessert. Yea! So I made Portuguese Custard Tarts. I first tasted these Pasteis de Nata at the airport in Lisbon when traveling with my daughter to visit my son and his wife in France. One of these was my breakfast along with coffee after an overnight flight. They were so tasty that I brought a package back with me to share with Hubby. We were fans from the get go.

When I was recovering from my multiple fractures sustained in 2023 my Physical Therapist was of Portuguese heritage. When asked about these tarts he referred to them by the Portuguese name and told me of a bakery in another town where they were made and very good. He added though that the bakery makes them for Sunday mornings and runs out quickly. I never got around to explore that option.

I have made custard tarts before but not specifically Pasteis de Nata. https://wordpress.com/post/mykitchenmythoughts.com/8145 and https://wordpress.com/post/mykitchenmythoughts.com/5246.

This recipe is from Food and Wine and was in my news feed as I was scrolling. It did not require fancy ingredients and was straight forward in its directions. https://www.foodandwine.com/pasteis-de-nata-8723092. The only thing I did differently was use 2 % milk instead of whole milk.

  • 2 sheets frozen puff pastry, thawed
  • 1 3/4 cups milk
  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1 cinnamon stick
  • 1 3-inch strip of lemon peel
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 2 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch
  • 2 tablespoons flour
  • 4 large egg yolks

Preheat oven to 500 degrees F. Layer the puff pastry and roll into a log. Cut this into 12 equal pieces. These are to flattened with wet fingers and shaped into 3-inch shallow bowls to fit into the muffin pan and up the sides. Leave these at room temperature while preparing the custard.

Put the milk, butter, cinnamon and lemon peel into a medium sauce pan over medium heat. While this is heating whisk the flour, sugar, and cornstarch in a medium bowl until combined. Whisk egg yolks in a large bowl until smooth. When milk mixture begins to boil , remove the cinnamon stick and lemon peel with a slotted spoon. Whisk in the flour mixture whisking constantly until thickened but not boiling about one minute. Remove from heat. Gradually add the milk flour mixture to the egg yolks whisking constantly. (The recipe instructions states here to strain through sieve into a heatproof measuring cup with spout. I did not do so and am proud to announce I had no scrambled egg bits at all. It was the constant whisking.)

Pour into the pastry cups and bake in preheated oven until golden brown. Then change oven to broiler setting and broil the tops until browned in spots. Let cool in pan for five minutes and then remove to cool on a wire rack.

Making the pastry cups was the hardest part. Next time I will cut circles out of puff pastry or I will roll the sections of puff pastry into flat circles before putting them in the muffin pan. The pastry was a little thicker than I had wanted. It is also important to have the various portions that make up the custard ready in their bowls before hand. The thing is I now have four egg whites in my fridge needing to be used. I had some leftover custard and baked it along with the tarts. We had this later spooned over canned peaches.

These were a hit with Hubby, very tasty. I had one and one-half along with a cup of tea for dessert while watching the Yankees lose the World Series in Game 5.

From liquids to solids…

~ nancyruth ~ Leave a comment

Two weeks after starting the ketotic diet I had surgery. The post-op diet was full liquids. Initially this was fine as I was not all that hungry after surgery but when I began feeling better/ more normal after four or so days it got very tedious.

I am so tired of all things vanilla! My meals have consisted of vanilla protein shakes, vanilla yogurt, vanilla pudding, vanilla ice cream with an occasional fruit popsicle and butterscotch pudding. When on solid food I will not be able to have chocolate or fresh fruits or vegetables but more flavors and tastes will be allowed. Then in two weeks I can resume my regular diet. But I’ll start slow because my stomach will not be used to eating as much as was normal.

I began dreaming about meals to make and eat after my two weeks of full liquid diet. I will have to grind or shred meats and eat them in a gravy sauce. I must have very cooked vegetables like green beans, beets, and carrots and must avoid gas producing ones such as broccoli, cauliflower, cucumbers, onions, and cabbages. I’m dreaming of a soft scrambled egg and piece of toast. Interestingly one can have toast but not plain bread.

The solid food comes with a caveat that it must be easily chewed to baby food consistency. For my first breakfast I had a softly scrambled egg with a piece of toast smeared with a smidgen of butter. This sat in my chest for a while. I had tea to wash it down over the course of the morning. In the early afternoon I had lunch comprised by one half can of tuna, one teaspoon of mayonnaise, and four saltine crackers. This seemed to go down more easily than the morning’s meal. At this rate of calorie consumption I may continue to lose weight.  I do not feel hungry but eat because I know one must have nutrients to keep the body and mind healthy.

Thoughts on day one of solid food: my planned meal of roast chicken, finely chopped with gravy did not go down well but I did enjoy my sweet potato and baby green peas. The grape flavored Popsicle made with real fruit was savored slowly like a fine glass of wine.

No Halloween candy for me this year. For day two I prepared a beef stew in the crockpot with stew beef, potatoes, baby carrots and green beans cooked with beef broth. I shredded my portion of beef with the immersion blender and this went down nicely. it was also quite tasty for such a simply prepared stew. I am eating more slowly than usual but this is a good thing. Today’s supper will be leftover beef stew and then the leftover roast chicken.  I will mush the chicken in its gravy so that I can swallow it more easily than the first time. Then I will make hamburger gravy which is a dish my mother made when we were growing up as a means to extend the meat to a family of six. But for me I added chopped spinach for a vegetable.

This is what my meals will consist of for two weeks. I am beginning to adjust to the lesser food amounts. However I am starting to crave the restless and mindless eating while watching TV in the evenings. I need to pick up my embroidery projects while watching the TV to occupy my hands and thoughts.

When there are dietary changes…

~ nancyruth ~ Leave a comment

Admittedly my dietary changes are temporary and thus make them easier to endure than something permanent.

First up, a ketotic diet was prescribed to supposedly reduce some belly fat prior to abdominal surgery. It was a high protein, moderate fat, and low carbohydrate diet. Step one: receive Ketotic, pre- and post-op diets in the mail. Panic over the idea of only 20 g of carbs per day. Step two: Buy every non-starchy vegetable in the freezer section of the grocery store. Reread diet over and over and find it is actually 40g carbs per day. Step three: Obsess over food choices. Wake up thinking about food and menu for the day. Get out scale and weigh breakfast foods. Plan Salmon for dinner.

Thoughts on day one: I spent a great deal of my mind’s time thinking about food. I think I missed on one serving of protein not having a cheese stick with my dinner. I was not hungry throughout the day much to my surprise. I saved my celery and peanut butter for my watching TV at night snack. Drinking 64 fluid ounces of water/liquid was simpler than I thought it would be.

This was my eating plan for two weeks. Luckily it came with four sample daily menus. Although I was to keep track of carbs and proteins, I figured if I did not eat the off-limit foods I would be in compliance. Giving up sugar and restless eating was the hard part as well as eating all those eggs for breakfast every day! I did enjoy having deli roast beef wrapped in lettuce and eating cottage cheese. The best meal other than grilled salmon was the beef stir-fry.

  • 5 ounces lean beef (I used steak-ums cut in strips)
  • 2 cups peppers, onion, and mushrooms
  • 2 tsp sesame oil, a bit of garlic, and 1 ½ Tab soy sauce

The meat and vegetables were cooked with the oil and garlic in the cast iron skillet with the soy sauce stirred in for serving. I supposed this could have been served over cauliflower rice but it was plenty to eat on its own.

I was often not hungry but missed the mindless eating of anything desired. This Keto diet was making me evaluate my eating choices of what, when, and how much. That is probably a good thing regarding one’s relationship with food.

Hubby went along with this eating plan to be supportive. What a guy! For one meal we saved up our Carb allotment to have a bun with our grilled hamburgers. Overall this experience has reduced our reliance on carb heavy foods for meals and snacks.