Cremeschnitte

What is Cremeschnitte?

It's a light and airy vanilla crème sandwiched between two thin, delightfully crisp layers of flaky pastry. It is a true classic among sweets from Central and Eastern Europe. It goes by a variety of names, including cream slice and, in certain situations, cream pie. According to Historical Sociolinguistics, the Cremeschnitte's origins can be traced back to the Austro-Hungarian empire's blending of two cuisines.

Samoborska kremnita from the town of Samobor and Zagrebaka kremnita from the capital, Zagreb, are the two most popular Cremeschnitte varieties in Croatia. The dish is commonly referred to as a 'vanilla slice' or 'snot block' in Australia. This dish is known as a 'custard slice' in New Zealand, and it consists of a puff pastry bottom, custard, puff pastry top, and icing sugar.

Cremeschnitte is most often simply sprinkled with icing sugar, it can also be topped with a smooth glacé icing, decorated with a traditional chevron design.

Ingredients

• Almost a pack of puff pastry
• 1 ltr milk
• 100g corn flour
• 200g icing sugar
• 25g icing sugar with 1 vanilla pod
• 3 eggs

Steps

1. Roll out the pastry dough and prick it with a fork. 
2. Cut into two equal-sized columns and bake at 180 °C/ 350°F for approximately 8-10 minutes until golden brown. 
3. Remove it from the oven. Leave to cool.
4. Add milk to corn flour and 2 tbsp icing sugar and vanilla sugar to the milk. Mix the mixtures.
5. Separate the eggs. 
6. Bring the milk-sugar-mixture to boil and slowly add the cornflour-mixture to milk und simmer until creme is thick.
7. Whisk egg whites with the rest of the icing sugar until thick. 
8. Stir in the egg yolks in the mixture and fold into warm creme. Allow the creme to cool down.
9. Evenly spoon over the pastry and allow the creme to cool.
10. Before you serve, cut the remaining pastry in slices, but it on the top and sprinkle with sugar.

Note:

Leave it overnight for better flavour. Cream slices also tastes good if topped with an additional layer of cream over the vanilla cream and this makes them even creamier!

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