Traditional Portuguese Custard Cakes
This vegan Pastel de Nata recipe is even easier than the traditional. These "pastéis" (or custard cakes) are made using only 7 ingredients, easy to find anywhere!
I grew up on these cakes as they're pretty much everywhere in my country. Every foreigner "knows" the best ones are sold in Belém as the Pastéis de Belém, and they line up for hours just to have a taste, but what they don't know is that that's a lie. Nearly every town in the district of Lisbon claims to have "THE BEST" pastéis de nata - spoiler alert, the best ones are in my hometown, Sintra. So, it's been a long time since I've wanted to try making a vegan version I could enjoy (and rub in my family's face).
This took some trials, as I had to try several versions of the custard and bring forth memories of my childhood memory until I could make it taste right. That's when I remembered that most traditional Portuguese sweets with custard and creams have lemon peel as a must.
Now I can guarantee that these taste just like the original!
With such an easy recipe, you have no excuse not to try them.
They may not look exactly like the real deal (my fault XD), but they sure are just as delicious!
Ingredients (for ~13 pastéis)
1 roll vegan puff pastry
2 cups (500mL) plant milk (I used oat)
1/3 cup (40g) corn starch
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp coconut sugar
1 slice lemon skin
cinnamon
Instructions
Mix corn starch with HALF of the plant milk of choice & leave on side
Pour the remaining plant milk into a saucepan and heat it on the stove until boiling
Stir in the corn starch mix (from step 1.), the sugar, vanilla extract, and a slice of lemon skin & cook until thickened
Leave to cool down at room temperature
Preheat oven to 200ºC
Line around 13 cupcake tins with the puff pastry
Sprinkle over cinnamon
Pour in the custard mix
Bake for around 25 minutes
Enjoy with or without cinnamon!
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