The Imperfect Cook: Bakeshop Edition

As you are probably all aware, my BIG, SCARY, practical exam is coming up in just over a week. I'm doing my best to study, and going over the possible items. Banana Cream Pie is one of the listed desserts, and since I haven't made Pastry Cream in ages, I thought I'd better review.
I'm not a huge fan of bananas, but desserts do tend to get eaten one way or another around here!

Here we go!
The ingredients are simple:
Milk, Egg Yolks, Whole Eggs, Sugar (divided into two equal portions), Cornstarch, Butter, and Vanilla.
First, we are going to heat up the milk. I usually set it to somewhere around medium. I don't want to boil it!!
Add one of the parts of sugar, and stir! I hope you are appreciating the fact that I am performing this left-handed!
Now for the egg yolks, and whole eggs...beat them! Muahaha!
Once they are well beaten, throw in that cornstarch and stir it all up!
Well done, well done.
Now the milk is getting a lot hotter. When it gets all frothy and steamy, with a little burbling under that foam, it is ready!
Now I am going to temper it with the egg mix. I don't want to add it all at once, because I don't really fancy cornstarchy scrambled eggs for lunch.
Whisk it as you slowly add the milk.
Now you want to have this pot of water on. You want a pot big enough that the steel bowl you are using for you milk/egg mix will fit inside, with the rim resting on the pot. Its a double-boiler! Hooray! Fill it a few inches with water. It doesn't need to be really full, just enough to produce a lot of steam. Have it come to a steady simmer, but a full boil can sometimes be too hot, so be careful.
When the steam is coming fast and furious, put your bowl on it and start whisking!!!
Faster! Faster!! FASTER!!! No scrambled eggs!!!
It will take a few minutes before it starts to thicken. When you see it start to boil, take it off the pot, and toss in your butter and vanilla (which looks disturbingly red in that pic...eww)
This is a nice consistency. Do it like this.
Now, because there is so much dairy in this (like...all of it) you don't want it to be sitting around at that warm "cooling-off" stage for very long. I would prefer to keep everyone alive and not being violently ill after eating my desserts. Just a personal preference.
So what I did is scrape my pastry cream into a smaller (cool) bowl, then rinse out my big bowl, fill it with ice, and then stick my pastry cream bowl on top of the ice....you still with me?
See? Big Bowl-- Ice. Small bowl-- pastry cream!
This cools it down really fast, so there's a lot less risk of bacteria growth.
While we are doing away with salmonella poisoning, lets chop up some banana!
Toss in the first layer.
When the pastry cream is no longer steaming, and feels cool-ish, splat some on top of those weird, mushy little circles. I think it was always the banana texture that threw me off.
Next layer! I used a particularly shallow pie pan, so I'm only gonna get these two layers in, but you might be able to fit another layer with a deeper dish.
Beeeeeautiful!
And there she is. Don't even start me on the mint garnish. Mint...and Banana?!?!
I...I don't know why I did it...I'm...sorry....it won't happen again.
The recipe probably makes enough for two good-sized cream pies. I made one small pie, and a bunch of tarts. So...go ahead and cut it in half if you want.

1 Liter Milk (you are probably better off with whole milk...I sinned, and used 1%)
250 g Sugar, divided into 2 parts
4 Egg Yolks
2 Whole Eggs
75 g Cornstarch
1 Tablespoon Vanilla
60 g Butter

The best thing about this recipe is....it can be used for ANYTHING! It doesn't have to be Banana Cream! It could be Butterscotch, or Chocolate, or Coconut! Or even...LEMON! (this one needs a few small adjustments...namely using water instead of milk, increasing sugar and cornstarch, and of course...adding lemon!) OR you can cut the cornstarch in half, and voila-- pudding!
And I can guarantee that it tastes better than any store-bought product!
You should try it. Its goooooood.