Richard's Travels Cooking Blog

Like me, you probably always thought that creme brulée meant using a propane torch (who doesn’t have one?!) to form the caramel over the cream. I recently discovered that this is wrong – there are many other ways to do it including a flambé. Since I had made my first flambé the week before I immediately got excited thinking about fire (which I got on video of course) and sweet cream. This is much easier to do at home than using a blow-torch and it probably won’t send you to the hospital if you’re careful. It takes a while to chill so you might want to prepare it the night before.

The texture is a bit different than a traditional creme brulée since you don’t get a hard top, but with a fluffy cream base and caramel topping it’s easy to see why this is a classic. You can even build on the flavor with your favorite liquor or other additions. I would like to try adding citrus zest like a spanish flan, and I’ll see if I can work out a chocolate version for my fiancée

When you do this you can make one large dish or use individual ramekins. I found it easiest to use one large dish and light the liquor before pouring it on (after using half a bottle of vodka trying to figure out the best method this worked well). It may not look as good as individual serving dishes but if you make it for guests who don’t have flambés often they won’t notice anything besides the fire.

This is actually simple to make, but the baking time varies depending on how you do it so it takes some patience. You can burn it or get a strong egg taste if you don’t do it right; I’ve been there several times and while I still enjoyed it, it wasn’t too popular.

Ingredients (serves 4)

• 2 cups (500ml) whipping cream
• 4 egg yolks (remove the whites to get a better consistency)
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 tbsp white sugar to cover the baked cream
• almost 1/4c golden rum or other strong liquor (40% alcohol)

Preparing the cream:

1. Pre-heat oven to 350F
2. Put the cream in a pot and heat it up while stirring frequently - try to remove it from the stove just before it boils
3. Put the 4 egg yolks in a bowl and whisk them a bit until they’re smooth
4. Add 1/4c sugar, salt, and vanilla to the eggs and whisk some more until it’s well-mixed
5. Once the cream is hot add it to the eggs slowly (put in a small splash at a time while whisking constantly); if you go too fast you can cook the eggs too soon. I took about a minute to mix it in.
6. Get out a baking dish large enough to hold everything, spray the inside with a bit of cooking spray, and pour in the cream mixture (if you have small ramekins you can use these instead to make individual servings)
7. 

   Ready to bake - the water ended up being a bit too low so you'll need a bit more. Without this water the cream will burn!

   Take another larger cooking dish, place the cream dish (or dishes) inside it, and put some hot water in the outside dish so it comes about half-way up (the top of the water should be about 1cm below the top of the cream) – this controls the temperature of the cream mixture and slows the baking so you can get a fluffy texture instead of a solid egg pudding.

8. Put it in the oven. Start off with an hour for a large dish or 25 minutes for small ramekins and after that check every 5-10 minutes until the texture is almost similar to jello. To check if it’s done take a small piece out with a knife; if there’s only a little liquid beneath the top it should be done. I used a large dish with high sides which takes a bit longer; after 1 hour and 20 minutes it was done. This cooks pretty slowly so waiting 5 minutes to check is ok.
9. Remove the dish from the oven and then put it in the fridge for at least 4 hours and up to several days (after 4 hours cover it up)

Now you’re ready for the fun (and dangerous) part – by topping the baked cream with a bit of sugar and burning the liquor on top of it you’ll end up with delicious caramel. It doesn’t take very much sugar or liquor to do this. I would usually add a lot more than the recipe says, but here you don’t want much or you won’t get the same result.

1. Sprinkle a thin layer of white sugar on top of the cream (thin enough to see through). This takes about 3-4 tbsp if you make this in one large container.
2. Turn a stove burner on high and get out a barbeque lighter. Leep the cream near the stove and away from anything flamable.
3. Take a 1/4 cup measure and fill it between 1/2 and 2/3 of the way with liquor (put away the bottle after to avoid lighting the fumes it contains). It doesn’t seem like much but this will give you a good fire; too much liquor will just end up sitting on top after you’re done. Of course if you’re already having a few drinks this might work out well
4. Place the liquor in a small pot, put the pot on the hot stove, and watch it closely.
5. You want to light the liquor right before it starts boiling; if it’s cold it won’t burn well but if it boils for a bit it won’t burn at all since most of the alcohol will be gone. As soon as you see the first bubbles as it starts to boil it’s ready to go.
6. Move the lighter towards the liquor until it starts to burn then put it away; holding the handle away from the flames, pour the liquor over the sugar. Don’t delay but be careful not to splash it. Since there isn’t much liquor you’ll probably just see some light blue flames but they’ll burn for a minute or so.

Serve as soon as the fire burns out – handle the dish with an oven glove since the fire makes it very hot. If no one was hurt during the flambé process this will disappear as quickly as the flames!

This recipe is brought to you by Richard’s Travels Cooking Blog.