Custard Pastry (Galatobouriko)

For the custard:

6 c. milk

2 c. sugar

¾ c. minus 1 T. dry cream of wheat cereal

9 egg yolks, beaten

1 T. butter

1 t. vanilla

For the pastry:

16 sheets of phyllo pastry

½ c. melted butter

For the syrup:

1 ¼ c. sugar

juice of ½ lemon

¾ c. water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 13 by 9 pan and set aside. In a saucepan, scald the milk over medium heat, then stir in the sugar. Add the cream of wheat gradually, stirring constantly until thickened. Stir ¼ of hot mixture into the egg yolks, then transfer the egg yolk mixture to the cream of wheat mixture and stir to blend until the mixture thickens. Remove from heat. Beat in 1 T. melted butter and vanilla and set aside to cool.

To assemble the pastry, lay 1 sheet of phyllo pastry in the prepared pan and brush the top of the pastry with the melted butter. Repeat this process with seven more sheets of phyllo. Pour the custard mixture over the pastry. Lay 8 more sheets of phyllo brushed with butter over the custard filling. Bake 45 minutes, or until lightly browned. While the pastry is baking, make the syrup.

To make the syrup, bring the sugar, lemon juice and water to a boil in a saucepan. Boil 5 minutes, then remove from heat. When the custard pastry is done, remove from over and cut into diamond shaped portions. Pour the hot syrup over the cut custard pastry in the pan. Serve warm of at room temperature. Makes 16 servings.