Mille Crepe Cake

Before I left for Jakarta 2 weeks back, I attempted at making Mille Crepe Cake... a no-bake cake filled with custard layers... it was a feat alright! It took me 24 hours from making the batter, the filling, letting the batter rest, cooking the crepes, layering it, chilling it and finally after all that I can taste the fruit of my loom!

Firstly you need to make the crepe batter. You have to rest the batter for at least 8 hours or overnight preferably. Resting the batter somehow makes a more pliable and tender batter.

90g butter (melted until it turns into a soft brown colour and set aside)
3 cups milk (heat until steaming not boiling and then set aside to cool)

In a mixer, add the following ingredients and mix on medium speed:-

6 eggs
1 1/2 cups flour
a pinch of salt
100g sugar

Slowly add the cooled milk and melted butter into the mixture. Store in a container and chill overnight or for at least 8 hours. Start making the crepes the next day by brushing a little oil and about 1/3 cup of batter each time ( I started with 1/4 cup but it didn´t cover my pan completely). You will get approximately about 20 crepes. Set aside. Some people layer each crepe with parchment paper but mine didn´t stick to one another.

Now... time to make the cream du jour... homemade pastry cream that I had to make doubled the amount because the kids kept coming in and asking if they could ´try´a spoonful! A spoonful ended up being a bowl and next thing I knew my custard cream is gone!

2 cups milk (bring to a simmer)
1 tsp vanilla extract or 1 vanilla bean pod (scraped and boil with the milk)

Cool the milk for 10 minutes before adding to the eggs

In a saucepan, whisk the following:-

6 egg yolks
1/2 cup cugar
1/3 cup sifted cornflour

50g butter (soften to add in LATER after the mixture cooled down)

Then whisk in the warm milk vigourously and place pan over low heat and continue whisking until mixture thickens. Remove from heat and cool. Add butter and mix throughly and chill.

2 cups heavy cream
1 tablespoon sugar

Whisk until stiff peaks and fold into the custard cream. I popped it in and out of the fridge as it was a warm morning and i could feel the custard cream melting. Assemble your cake layer by layer... one layer of crepe, a layer of cream until all is gone... maybe next time i shall make 1.5 times the custard because i like thick layers of cream... thats just me though... once the last layer of crepe is set, i sprinkled some sugar and caramalized it with a torch, piped some cream and strawberries and dust with icing sugar.. voila... bon appetit!