Sunday, March 3, 2013

Rosie Makes Crème Brûlée.


Today, Rosie used up the last of her egg yolks
leftover from making all those consommés.
I'm making crème brûlée, or burnt cream.
It consists of a rich, creamy custard base.
Immediately before serving,
I sprinkle on a sugar topping and torch it,
resulting in a caramelized layer on top.

So far, to use up the yolks,
 I've made Momofuku's Crack Pie,

 and Tocino de Cielo,
Bacon from Heaven,
which is a dairy-free flan.


Ingredients for Custard Base:
If you notice the measuring cup above,
I had a little shy of one cup egg yolks.
I'm going with 8 large yolks here.
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
zest of 1 orange
1 pint heavy cream, heated to a bare simmer

Heat oven to 250 degrees.
Beat yolks.  
Gradually beat in sugar.
Slowly, drizzle in the heated cream, beating constantly.
Stir in vanilla and orange zest.
This makes 1 quart.
Pour into ramekins and place ramekins in a larger baking dish.
Carefully pour boiling water about two-thirds up the sides of the ramekins.
Bake 55-60 minutes, until set.
Let cool, then refrigerate several hours before serving.

To make the brûlée part:
Sprinkle turbinado sugar (my preference) or white sugar over top.
Using a butane torch, caramelize the sugar.
You could put this under a broiler, but you'd need to constantly watch it.
I like using my little mini-blow torch since I can control the caramelizing.

I have videos at the end to show how to caramelize the tops.

Now for the step-by-steps:
Zest the orange.
Inhale the aroma from the oil.


Give the eggs a good beating
for 2-3 minutes.
Notice the change in color.
When the eggs lighten ...
...  gradually beat in sugar.


The eggs will lighten in color and in texture.

Very slowly, drizzle in the hot cream,
beating constantly on high.
Be careful here.
You don't want scrambled eggs.

Stir in the orange zest.

Squirt in the vanilla.

Pour into ramekins.

Pour boiling water 2/3 of the way up the ramekins.

Bake in a 250 degree oven for about 60 minutes.

I prefer using the shallower ramekins.
(The ones with the scalloped edges.)
There's more surface area to caramelize.

For the bruleé, you could use regular sugar,
but I prefer turbinado sugar which is
a minimally processed sugar.
I'm also going to try to flame a chocolate orange liqueur.

 Sprinkle the sugar over top.

 And torch it.


 

Crème brûlée is insanely good.


Here are the videos showing the brûlée part:



I found a chocolate orange liqueur which I'm experimenting with.
If you use a liqueur to flambé, it needs to be heated first.



I'm using turbinado sugar and the liqueur on my Crème Brûlée.


2 comments:

Marilyn said...

So, have you figured out which of the three egg custards you prefer yet? The flan, the dairy-free custard, or the creme brulee?

Rosie Hawthorne said...

The three custards were very similar.

If I had to choose, I'd go with the creme brulee, Marilyn.

I liked the orange zest I put in it and I like the contrast between the crunch of the caramel topping and the smooth custard.

Plus, there's that whole torching thing going on.