Baked Tapioca Pudding (焗西米布甸)

Here goes nothing! Cindy suggested I give this a try, and helpfully said to search sago pudding, rather than tapioca. Almost all of the recipes called for custard powder, much to my frustration. I don't need any more powders and mixes in here, so I had to kind of improvise. From what I've read, custard powder is mostly cornstarch, flavour, and colour. There's not much I want to do about the colour, and I'm decently sure that flavour is really coconut milk and vanilla, so I'm crossing my fingers.

Ingredients (makes 8 100mL servings):
1 cup small white tapioca pearls (may be labelled as sago, but comes from cassava starch, ingredients might say "manioc")
1 can (400mL) coconut milk
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup water
1/2 cup cornstarch
4 eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla
finely grated zest of one lemon


Method:
Boil pearls in lots of water for 10 minutes, then turn down heat simmer until the majority of pearls are translucent.
Rinse with cold water, drain, and set aside in a bowl.
On medium-low, heat coconut milk, and sugar to just boiling.
In a separate bowl, whisk water into cornstarch and add to cream mixture.
Heat until thickened.
Remove from heat and whisk into eggs in a steady stream.
Strain to remove lumps.
Whisk in vanilla and lemon zest
Mix in tapioca.
Spoon the mixture into 8 115mL ramekins.
Bake at 400F on the middle rack in a hot water bath for 15-30 minutes until set.
Use a torch to caramelise sugar to the top if you wish.


Comments:
Every recipe called for butter, but I'm thinking that it was mostly for the fat content, so I left it out. I figured it wasn't for structure, since it's a warm dessert, and the butter would be all melted anyway.

I wasn't sure how it would turn out, so I didn't use red bean paste (it'd be a tragic waste if the pudding turned into an abysmal failure).

It wasn't sweet or flavourful enough, and it was too thick, so it needs more sugar, more vanilla and less cornstarch. It'd probably be better to just yolks, rather than whole eggs, but it just seems so wasteful.

Verdict:
I'm glad it set and worked. I'm tabling it until I have the right proportions.