Crème Brûlée: Attempt the First

I was in my kitchen today, proud of myself for having started this blog and promising not to write another post until I can add pictures. Indeed, I even distracted myself by making dinner: broiled beef short ribs and brown rice with peas. But while my brain was patting my back, my body pulled a Leroy Jenkins and had eggs, heavy cream, and a vanilla bean on the table. Crème brûlée? Silly body, real desserts have flour and sugar in it. But fried dough yesterday, something lighter today. 
Why every time I make something, I gotta have 5 friends to share it with? Well, I don't have 5 friends, so this serves 4. Warning: This is a thrown together version of two different recipes and some guessing. 


Crème brûlée
Serves 4


3/4 cup skim milk
1/3 cup heavy cream
1 vanilla bean
3 egg yolks
2 tbsp sugar
4 small ramekins
1 large cake pan


1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Place milk, cream, vanilla pulp, and bean in saucepan. Bring to boil briefly, then turn off heat. Let sit for 10 minutes. Take out bean.
3. Beat egg yolks, then whisk in sugar. Whisk in warm milk mixture little by little.
4. Evenly distribute mix between ramekins. Place ramekins in cake pan and fill pan with water to halfway up the sides of the  ramekins. Bake for 35-40 minutes.
5. Remove ramekins from pan and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.
6. Take ramekins out and let sit for half an hour before sprinkling sugar and burning it. 


Yes, 2 whole hours. It has to cool down, set up, and  get creamy.When it comes to cooking, my downfall is being overly concerned with food safety, leading to overcooking, and being mind-numbingly impatient, leading to under-waiting. So, egg safety, courtesy of the FDA: 
In order to kill any potential bacteria (which are not a huge threat anyway), cook until eggs are firm. In this case, after baking, the custard should be more firm, but still "tremble," meaning if you were to move the ramekin, it should move slightly. If it moves a lot, it needs more time. To play it very safe, pasteurized eggs are specially treated to eliminate bacteria and can be found in many grocery stores.


No pictures yet, but soon. Oh soon...