Lychee Custard

Happy Diwali to all my friends and readers!!!

Any festival is incomplete without sweets and especially Diwali is one festival where all the Indian households are busy making various varieties of sweets and snacks.Though I did not make many varieties I celebrated the festival in a simple manner.

Lychee is one of my favorite fruits and as it is seasonal and hence not available through the year, I always keep a tin of lychees for my desserts. The tin was about to expire and that's when I decided to make something quickly with it.I was planning to mix lychees with vanilla ice cream, like how we get in corner house(Bangalore) but I wasn't in a mood to eat ice cream because of my bad throat hence I decided to use the second option , which was to mix it with custard.I generally use various kinds of fruit combinations in custard although the base(custard) is the same.The addition of various fruits gives custard a different and distinct taste.The fleshy and juicy lychees adds a nice taste to custard and when paired with vanilla ice cream it tastes divine.It is a very simple dessert with not much of effort required to prepare it and also can be made in advance.
Ingredients:
1 tin Lychees or 15 fresh Lychees
3 tbsp Vanilla custard powder
4-5 tbsp Sugar
500 ml Milk
2 tbsp finely chopped Almonds
2 tbsp finely chopped Pistachios

Method:

• Take 1/4 cup milk aside and boil the remaining milk.Mix the custard powder in the remaining 1/4 cup milk until very well dissolved.
• Pour this in the boiling milk and mix simultaneously until it is mixed well and boil over low flame.
• Add sugar to this and boil until the custard is thick and coats the backside of the spoon.If you draw a line on the back of the spoon it should stay like that which means the custard is perfectly done.
• Cool this and refrigerate it until it is cold.
• Meanwhile drain the lychees from tin and give a fresh water bath to it and cut into quarters or big chunks.If you are using the fresh ones remove the skin and seeds from it and cut into big chunks.
• Mix the lychee chunks and finely chopped dry fruits in the custard and refrigerate for 4-5 hrs before serving.

Serve it cold with some chopped pistachios over it.You can even serve it with vanilla ice cream.

Notes:

1. You can serve the lychee custard with vanilla ice cream which tastes divine.
2. Take care that custard is neither very thick nor thin and also adjust the sweetness according to your preference.
3. Always cut lychees into big chunks as the lychee flesh in each bite gives a special taste to the custard.
4. Also add more number of nuts as they give special crunch while eating.
   

I am sending this to Pari's 'Only-Sweets and Desserts' event which is being hosted by Gayathri.