Tooty the Chef and the United Nations Trifle

Coloured blancmange was becoming increasingly difficult to find in the highstreet shops of the dear old U.K. Sick to death of yellow custard in his trifles, Tooty the Chef embarked upon a mission to find an alternative, by shopping in lesser emporiums that featured ‘stuff’ from all over the planet. Stuff such as this…

Mango jelly and pandan custard. Yellow and green. Pakistani and Thai. Perfect. When he informed Number One Son, Number One Son responded with:

“Make it now! Make it now!

But there was a problem: no canned fruit in the house. How could the hatted one have become so lax? But fear not; there were a couple of apples in the crisper…

From France and South Africa respectively. Oh, how international. So, without further ado, he set to boiling them down a bit. Once cooled, he added the mango jelly and some UK sourced sponge fingers, and placed it into the fridge…

Sadly the pandan custard, although arriving in a large satchet, created very little green custard. Just enough, barely, to cover the apple/jelly/ sponge fingers combo…

“Shit, arse, and bollocks!” the great chef was heard to utter beneath his breath and from behind his greying beard. This called for emergency action. And what action it was. He found this in the back of the wall cupboard…

Crema Catalana – from Spain! It was out-of-date, but he didn’t let that small fact worry him. “They have to put dates on stuff,” he assured anyone within hearing range, “they have to by law. It doesn’t mean anything – unless it’s chicken, of course.” Moments later…

…it was blubbing nicely on the stove. But when added to the trifle…

…still came up short. Why are these portions so darned small? So, once more he delved into the larder – discovering, in the process…

…a satchet of butterscotch flavoured Angel Delight. Not, perhaps the obvious topping for a trifle; but the Dream Topping that he swore lived behind the Waitrose breadcrumbs and Sainsbury’s boil-in-the-bag Basmati rice, had fled the scene. The result…

The surface of a planetoid from an Earplug Adventure. But when dished up…

…it was. to quote the formerly-mentioned Number One Son, “The best yet.”

Tooty Triumphs once again!

Tooty the Chef’s Rubbery Custard Surprise

It’s not often that Tooty the Chef turns his amazing gastronomic talents to the subject of sweets; but when he does, it’s going to be worth the effort. Well in theory anyway. The Rubbery Custard Surprise started well enough. Our resident  silly hat wearer rolled out some puff pastry into thin layers…

He then estimated the surface area required to fill the mould at varying depths; cut the requisite  four differing sizes out of the pastry; then baked them…

For some reason he had expected them to expand in every direction. They didn’t. As they grew upwards, they shrank sideways. But he cared not one jot – just as long as one of them fitted in the bottom of the mould – which it did, of course…

Then it was time to tackle the tricky part: making the custard thick enough to set, but not too hard that it  required a pick axe to get through. Here he was only partially successful. Going heavy on the custard powder, and light on the milk, the custard was set before it had begun boiling. Nevertheless Tooty the Chef pressed on and dragged it from the pan into the mould…

At this point there was to have been another layer of puff pastry; but for reasons that will become clear, the great nosh-maker went straight to the cooked slices of apple…

…which he coated liberally with cinnamon. The following picture explains the loss of a pastry layer: he needed it to fill out the huge gaps in what would have appeared the third layer. Oops…

Unable (probably because of his age) to learn from his mistakes – or ‘creative hiccups’ as he prefers to call them – he produced  another floppy custard brick…

…finally topping it off with the third (fourth?) layer of pastry…

…which didn’t quite fit.  Hopeful that a hour or two in the cold might make it all sag slightly, and therefore fill the mould correctly, Tooty proceeded to the fridge…

Although appearing confident, the Wok-Master had an inkling that this was not going to be a tour de force in the realm of custard, so whipped up a fabulous stir-fry…

…that would leave his victims so full and satisfied that they wouldn’t notice this…

Oh dear, he forgot that his propane oven burns the bottom of pastry at the drop of a hat. So he pretended that the brown bits were cinnamon. He also provided a knife and fork to eat it with. But at least he didn’t need a hammer and chisel: it could have been worse. Pity it looked so dull and tasted so  bland. Or should that be termed ‘subtle’?