Anybody a custard expert? What did I do wrong?!
 

I attempted to make a custard recipe yesterday from the South Beach cookbook (I'm trying to go low-carb with little success ...LOL). The custards came out terrible! They are watery and awful and taste basically like brown water... very unappetizing. I'm thinking that I did something wrong? I followed the recipe below. If anybody has an idea as to what might have happened to my poor dessert, please let me know! :)

Chilled Coffee Custard

1.5 cups 1% milk
2 eggs, beaten
3 TB sugar substitute
2 tsp instant coffee
2 tsp vanilla

In medium bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, sugar sub, coffee, and vanilla until well-blended. Pour into four six-ounce custard cups and place in a 10" skillet. Fill skillet with water to 1/2" from tops of the custard cups. Bring water to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 10 minutes. Remove cups from skillet, cover with plastic wrap touching the surface of the custard, and refrigerate for 3 hours.

The only custard recipe I have is for rice custard. Suppose you could drop out the rice for plain custard. I suspect the 1% milk is the culprit for your watery result. That will certainly cut down your fat content but not sure how much it will really cut out the carbs. Here is the recipe I use minus the rice.

1 qt milk (I use whole milk)
3 tbsp melted butter
1/2 tsp salt
2 c sugar (since I do 'no flour/sugar' I'd probably use splenda here)
3 eggs beaten
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp nutmeg

Mix all together and pour into a buttered 2 qt casserole (can probably get away with smaller casserole as the rice is not adding to the bulk) and set into a pan of hot water. Sprinkle with more nutmeg. Bake at 350 for 1.25 - 1.50 hours. May need to adjust the cooking time as well, again due to the rice not adding to the bulk. If you decide to, the rice for this recipe calls for 1 cup of cooked rice.

It makes a delicious rice custard. As mentioned, I follow the 'no refined flour/no refined sugar' diet. Changing out the sugar to splenda would be the only change I would make. In fact, might do this one day this week. Haven't made it for quite a while.

Sounds like you did everything right. I have used this recipe and it turns out right, is it possible that the water you used in cooking some how got inside the custard cups. To much water, to vigorous boiling, lid on too soon. South Beach works well for me, a lot of cooking, but for the most part good food and good nutrition. The coffee should be the grains, not made coffee. That's all I have

I make my custards in the microwave. No water needed. Set my micro on 70% power. Put dishes in a circle. depending on your oven check after 5 min--may need to go as long as 7. If you make pudding in you micro, you can use that to judge the time.

Yes-I would try adding a little corn starch or Knox Gelatin-you had no thickener and never did custard in Microwave or on top of stove-mine does the trick in the oven baking-350degrees 35-40 minutes

I've made custard in a skillet for years, and your recipe should work fine BUT make sure the water is simmering, not boiling, and put the cups on a rack--or even a washcloth--so they're not touching the bottom of the pan and getting direct heat from the burner. Real custard does not need a thickener other than the eggs, but too high heat makes them "weep." Custard should come out silky smooth, not rubbery or with little holes throughout, which is caused by too high a heat.

Thanks for all the replies. Maybe I did let the water boil a little bit too high, instead of simmering. And because of that, maybe drops of water did get into the custard. Well, I still have extra of all the ingredients, and since Marielle has made this same recipe and it was okay, I'll try it again and see what happens. :) Although the one thing that is really stumping me - why the plastic wrap touching the top of the dishes? Is that to prevent a hard crust being formed?

If you bake an egg custard too long, it will become watery. I haven't cooked one on the stove like the recipe calls for, but over cooking could be a possibility.