Peach and verbena feuilleté

A recipe from cooking-ez.com

For 1 feuilleté, you will need:

• 1 250 g Puff or flaky pastry (pâte feuilletée)
• 2 30 g caster sugar
• 3 2 sprigs Verbena
• 4 250 ml whole milk
• 5 3 egg yolks
• 6 30 g caster sugar
• 7 20 g cornflour
• 8 2 egg whites
• 9 70 g caster sugar
• 10 1 kg 500 g peach
• 11 5 tablespoons Sugar syrup
• 12 3 tablespoons lemon juice
• Total weight: 2,390 grams

Times:

Preparation	Resting	Cooking	Start to finish
1 hour 60 min.	20 min.	5 min.	2 hours 25 min.

Step by step recipe

1	Prepare a "feuilletage" with 250 g Puff or flaky pastry (pâte feuilletée) and 30 g caster sugar, as shown here.
2	Make the light verbena custard Rinse and dry 2 sprigs Verbena. Pick off the leaves and discard the stalks.
3	Cut the verbena leaves with scissors into a saucepan containing 250 ml whole milk.
4	Bring to the boil, then cover and leave to infuse for at least 15 minutes.
5	After this, strain the milk and discard the verbena leaves. Use this flavoured milk to make a verbena confectioner's custard or french pastry cream (see here for details).
6	When the verbena custard is finished, cover it and stand the saucepan in cold water to cool it.
7	Meanwhile, make a meringue by beating 2 egg whites, folding in 70 g caster sugar at the end.
8	When the verbena custard and the meringue are more or less at the same temperature, put two tablespoonsfuls of meringue into the custard.
9	Mix gently with a whisk, just to "loosen" the custard a little, as it is firmer than the meringue.
10	Then tip the remaining meringue into the custard and fold in gently, using a soft spatula.
11	You will now have a light custard with a delicious verbena flavour.
12	Prepare the peach slices Peel 1 kg 500 g peach by plunging them into boiling water fro 10 seconds...
13	...then transfer them to cold water.
14	The peaches will now be easy to peel.
15	Cut the peaches into quarters...
16	...and remove the hard red part that was next to the stone. Then slice in half again lengthways. Put the peach slices into a bowl and sprinkle with a mixture of 5 tablespoons Sugar syrup and 3 tablespoons lemon juice to stop them turning brown. Mix round gently. If you will not be using the peaches immediately, cover them with plastic film and refrigerate until needed.
17	Assemble the feuilleté Cover the pastry base (feuilletage) with an even layer of the light verbena custard.
18	Drain the peach slices and arrange them in a double rosette on the custard.
19	To finish, decorate with a small sprig of verbena.

Remarks

You will have noticed that the peaches in this recipe have not been poached. This is not necessary in their main season, or towards the end of it. Poaching is more useful for the first peaches of the season, and you can see how to poach peaches here.

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