Crema Poeta (Vanilla Pudding)

Recipe adapted from www.pickycook.com

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp unsalted butter
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 tbsps cornstarch
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 1/2 cups whole milk
• 1 vanilla bean (seeds scraped out)
• 4 large egg yolks
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions:

1. Place the butter in a large bowl and lay a fine mesh strainer across the top of the bowl.
2. In a saucepan, off of the heat, mix together the sugar, corn starch, and salt. Gradually add the milk until well blended. Turn the heat to medium and heat until milk is very warm, but not boiling. Whisk in the vanilla bean seeds and egg yolks until blended. Using a spatula, stir constantly until the mixture thickly coats the spatula. Keep an eye on this or your yolks will cook, resulting in scrambled egg bits!
3. Remove the mixture from the heat and pour through the strainer. (The idea here is to catch any eggs that happened to cook so that they don’t ruin the consistency if your pudding.) Mix well until butter is well blended into the pudding. Cover and refrigerate until chilled. Serve with vanilla wafers (optional).