Crème Brulee

Crème Brulee, Burnt Cream, Trinity Cream, or whatever other name is given to this dessert. Call it whatever you want, “a custard by any other name would taste as sweet” -Bill Shakesweight. With multiple countries claiming they are the creator, it is unlikely anyone will know exactly who made it first.
Crème Brulee is the dessert that is good for any occasion. It has stood the test of time at high end restaurants. While other desserts have become outdated or cliché, Crème Brulee still finds its way into fine dining and upscale menus. Nowadays, those high end restaurants are putting extraordinary twists on the classic dessert but showing restraint and really mastering a classic is far more impressive.
As the pictures shown above will display, not every recipe has been completely mastered but practice makes perfect and with each attempt results a better outcome. The sugar in this recipe provides an incredible hardened layer, and it’s possible the code has been “cracked”. Yikes, let’s move past that joke.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Beat egg yolks, granulated sugar, bourbon, and vanilla (extract works here unless you want to infuse the cream with vanilla bean), in a mixing bowl until combined.
Bring the whipping cream to a slight boil, over medium low heat, in a small sauce pot. It is truly more of a simmer, you just want the cream to start to form small bubbles along the outside edge of the pot. Remove the pan from the heat.
Slowly add a bit of the cream, about 1/4 cup, to the eggs while whisking the eggs. This tempers the eggs and keeps them from turning into scrambled eggs. Continue to add cream to the eggs little by little until all of the cream is whisked into the eggs and the egg mixture is completely tempered.
Equally divide and pour the custard into soufflé dishes. Do not fill all of the way to the top, leave a little bit of room for expansion.
The best crème brulee dish is one that is wider than it is tall. You want one that is shallow and wide. The ones pictured above are ok but not the best, they are great if you like a great deal of custard compared to a small amount of caramelized sugar but if you want more burnt sugar you will need a dish that is wider and more shallow.
Arrange the dishes into a roasting pan/shallow hotel pan. Add boiling water to the pan, enough to come half way up the sides of the dishes. The water will help to make sure each custard is cooked evenly.
Bake the custard for 30 minutes.
Remove the pan from the oven and remove the dishes from the pan. Allow the custard to come to room temperature before placing them in he refrigerator overnight.
The next day remove the custard from the refrigerator and sprinkle one tablespoon of turbinado sugar overtop of each custard. Gently rotate and shake the sugar so that is covers the entire surface of the custard.
You can either broil the soufflés for ten minutes until the sugar caramelizes or you can use a torch to gently burn the sugar. If you are using a torch, do a practice run first on some extra sugar, if you aren’t careful you will scorch the sugar and ruin all of your work.
Let the Crème Brulee rest for 5 minutes and then get crackin’!