Passionfruit Vanilla Slice

I am lucky enough to have a canteen at my work that not only makes fresh lunches every day, but often bakes sweets such as muffins, cupcakes and the most popular – Vanilla Slice.

This special only comes around about once a month, but when it does, the canteen needs to advertise that they are taking pre-orders sometimes up to five days in advance! This is because they cannot handle the huge demand and onslaught of employees running at the vanilla slice trolley circulating the office with their coins in hand!

Some days, the trolley hasn’t even made it to our level on the building because they have sold all of their vanilla slices before making it to our department.

What this comes down to really, is the love people have for vanilla slice.

Isn’t this really just some custard squished between pastry with some sweet icing?

Yes, that’s exactly what it is.

And coming from a custard-lover – this is a perfectly good justification for why the dessert is oh-so-perfect!

I decided to make a vanilla slice on the weekend.

I had to double the custard recipe as by the time I got to laying the custard out over the biscuits, there was only half as much left as when I started…(Something to do with me eating all the custard whilst cooking it, but I cant remember the finer details…)

Mum has always made vanilla slice with Sao biscuits instead of the classic – pastry. I love the use of these square sweet cracker biscuits because it makes laying these out as the base and top a fun jig-saw experience.

They also save the trouble of puff pastry and taste delicious!

Here’s the general recipe for passionfruit vanilla slice using Sao Biscuits. The custard quantity can change a fair bit as I simply added more custard powder and sugar as I felt it needed as I went along.  

Passionfruit Vanilla Slice

Ingredients

1 packet Sao biscuits – laid out in a square tray

8 tablespoons of custard with 8 table spoons of sugar

4 cups milk

Icing

Icing sugar

2 tablespoons butter

Passionfruit pulp of two passionfruit

Boiling water

Method

·         Lay out Sao biscuits in a square tray leaving no gaps.

·         Mix 1 cup milk with the custard powder and sugar, creating a smooth and rice custard sauce.

·         Warm the 3 cups of milk in a saucepan on the stove slowly, then add the custard mixture to this slowly, whisking constantly.

·         As the custard thickens, keep adding the custard liquid to the milk on the stove until you have thick yellow custard.

·         Add more sugar/custard powder depending on taste and consistency.

·         Pour this over the Sao biscuit sheet layer and spread evenly with a spatula.

·         Top the custard layer with another sheet of Sao biscuits.

·         Make the icing by melting the butter and mixing all ingredients in.

·         Pour this over the top layer of Sao biscuits and spread evenly.

·         Refrigerate for a few hours or until hard enough to keep together once cut.

Enjoy!