In a medium bowl, weigh the sugar, cornflour, salt and cream. Add the
egg yolks last and hand whisk to make a creamy paste. Stream the
milk in then the vanilla (paste or scraped pod and seeds) and whisk
well. Scrape the mix into a 20 cm (8 in) saucepan.

Adding the egg yolks last helps stop them forming little hard orange ‘cooked’
granules at the start.

Place the saucepan on a medium–high heat and hand whisk at a slow
pace to allow the heat to suffuse through the mix. Work the small
balloon whisk into the corners of the saucepan (where the custard
thickens first). After around 3 minutes of whisking, the custard will
start to look like a creamy liquid.*

Speed up the whisking now – the custard will thicken fast. It will
look lumpy but just whisk quickly and it will all come together into an
evenly thick paste in another 1 minute.

Don’t give up at the lumpy stage. It is NOT failure – just the custard
cooking at different rates. Keep whisking to achieve silky, evenly thick
success.

As soon as it looks smooth and thick, slow down the whisking and
wait for a few burp-like bubbles to pop over the surface. It’s a super
thick custard and your whisk should leave obvious furrows as it
moves through the mix.

Letting the custard visibly boil means the starches are fully cooked, making
a thick, stable custard.

Take the pan off the heat and remove the vanilla pod (if using).

Scrape the custard into a bowl and press a piece of plastic wrap on
the surface of the custard to prevent a rubbery skin forming. Chill for
at least 1 hour.**

* If you haven’t been moving the custard well enough as it co oks, you will notice
brown flecks of overcooked custard starting to show. To fix this, use a spatula
to push the custard through a sieve into a clean bowl at the end of cooking.

** If, after chilling, the custard appears gloopy then it’s undercooked. Simply
return it to a saucepan over a low heat and VERY slowly bring it to the
boil  again.