Custard Tart Heaven

Another country, another rowing training camp!  In the past my rowing club visited Seville for a week over Easter every year to get some serious training in, with the coaches putting us through our paces.  But Seville is a long way to drive with a trailer full of boats.  So last year we tried the South of France, and this year was the turn of  Portugal, at a sweet coastal town called Figueira de foz, at the mouth of the Mondego river, the longest river located exclusively in Portuguese territory.
Figueira de foz itself was obviously once a pretty fishing town, but now the beach front has become a tourist's haven, with lots of high-rise hotels and apartment buildings.  Strolling around the back streets of the old town was much more fun, seeing the traditionally tiled houses in perfect tree-lined streets.
The place we stayed in turned out to be a bit of a disaster, but on Boat Race day we were invited to watch the huge TV at The Paintshop Hostel, run by a lovely English couple, and we all wished we had been staying there!
As training camp involves training three times a day for 6-7 days, there's not much time (or energy) to explore a town, but one of our girls had been before and had met the local rowers, so we were invited to have dinner with them before we left, and it was delicious - lightly battered and fried sardines (which you eat from head to tail!), followed by monkfish, prawn and rice stew, made with locally grown rice.  The locals also wanted to tell me about their traditional dishes, one of which is a dessert made from pigs blood (which I didn't try!).  Salted cod is very big here, as is great seafood, so we were not likely to go hungry, and certainly had a great supply of protein to keep us fit and healthy.
One thing I did become slightly addicted to though, was the deliciously tempting custard tarts (pasteis de nata), and found myself trying one from a different bakery each day until I had researched them all to find the best!
And as with most things I love, I then want to make them myself, as most things are better homemade, although on this occasion I think I have been beaten by the experts!  I chose to try a recipe by Diana Henry that was published in the Telegraph a few years ago, you can find it here.  As Diana so cleverly mentions, the bakers in Portugal having been making these for years, so don't expect that you will get it right first time!
One thing I would point out having tried to make them is that getting the pastry as thin as possible is important, and maybe after making your swirls it would be better to roll them out with a rolling pin before putting into the tin?  Apart from that, the custard was delicious and lemony, and the pastry beautifully flaky, so not bad for a first attempt.
I am scared about having another attempt though - who is going to eat them all?!!!

Happy Baking.

Joy x