Easy Lavender Crème Brûlée Recipe for 2
Unlock a floral symphony with our easy-to-master LavenderCréme Brûlée for 2 recipe.
Servings: 3 servings
Ingredients
- 3 extra-large egg yolks
- ¼ cup sugar, plus 1 tablespoon for each serving
- 1 ½ cups heavy cream or half-and-half
- 1 teaspoons dried culinary lavender buds
- ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Instructions
Before you start:
- When baking the custard, a water bath is worthwhile. It makes the cooking gentler and results more even.
For the custard
- Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 325 degrees F. Bring a kettle of water to a boil.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the egg yolks, and ½ cup of the sugar together on low speed until just combined.If mixing by hand: In a bowl, beat yolks and sugar together until it is a light yellow in color, using a wire whisk.
- Meanwhile,in a small saucepan simmer cream and lavender until it's very hot to the touchbut not boiling. With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the cream to the eggs.Add the vanilla and pour into 6 to 8-ounce ramekins until almost full. If mixing in cream by hand: Slowly whisk in cream into the egg mixture until smooth.
- Place ramekins in a baking pan, taking care not to splash water into ramekins, pour enough boiling water into pan to reach halfway up sides of ramekins. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes (25 to 30 minutes for shallow fluted dishes), until the custards are set when gently shaken and digital instant-read thermometer inserted in centers registers 170 to 175 ℉Begin checking the temperature about 5 minutes before recommended time.Tip: the custards are done when still quite jiggly in the center.
- Remove the custards from the water bath, cool to room temperature. Once cool tightly wrap ramekins and refrigerate for at least 1 hour up to a couple of days.
How to make the creme brulee topping
- Uncover ramekins, if condensation has collected on custards, blot moisture with paper towel. Sprinkle each with about 1 Tablespoon of sugar; tilt and tap each ramekin to distribute sugar evenly, dumping out excess sugar. To caramelize sugar, ignite torch and sweep flame from perimeter of custard toward middle, keeping flame about 2 inches above ramekin, until sugar is bubbling and deep golden brown. For oven broiler method. Place ramekins in a broiler 2 to 3 inches from heat source. Turn on broiler. Cook until sugar melts and browns or even blackens a bit, about 5 minutes.
- Allow to sit at room temperature for a minute until the caramelized sugar hardens and refrigerate, uncovered, to rechill, 30 to 40 minutes. Serve within two hours.
Video
Notes
One thing to note: Be sure to let the custard set for several hours in the refrigerator before brûléeing the top, otherwise you'll end up with soupy custard.
In the absence of a kitchen torch, a simpler (and safer) solution is to use your oven’s broiler. For tips on using this method see How to make Crème brûlée without a torch section above.
For tips on how to avoid burning the topping see the section on Crème Brûlée Topping