Masala Crème Brûlée - A Franco-Indian Love Story!

Have you ever tasted a Crème Brûlée? If you did, you would perfectly understand if I said that it tastes like a dream layered in sugar! Literally translating to 'Burnt Cream' in French, it is one of the several hallmarks of French Cuisine, known for its Crepes and Soufflés. This renowned French dessert may be simple in its appearance - looking like some over-burnt cheese pie, but serving it is an art, practiced to the tee in any French restaurant worthy of its name and origin. 

I had my first proper Crème Brûlée experience at Le Petit Cochon Dingue, a cosy French Cafe located in the Lower-Town of Old Quebec. A dear friend, his wife and I were visiting Quebec City, Canada, and we decided to try this restaurant after a long tiring walk along the narrow streets of Quebec. Seeing it to be an authentic French place, I excitedly ordered the dessert without even bothering about the entrée. After some good ten minutes, the waitress brought a small ramekin full of something that looked like thick-set-yogurt strewn with sugar. She then whipped out a small gun-like device and in front of my eyes spewed fire on the dainty custard. Then with a smile, she said "Enjoy your dessert Monsieur!", and walked away as briskly as she had come. 

When I turned my eyes back to the ramekin, I saw that the sugar had been uniformly burnt and caramelized into a thin, shiny layer. With the tears of joy blurring my sight, I picked up my spoon, ready for attack. CRUNCH! My friend's spoon had somehow found its way into the ramekin, and the first piece was already on its way into his mouth! "Mmmmmmm..." He said. "Mmmmmm..." Not wanting to waste a second longer, I quickly followed, and dug my spoon into the hardened caramel crust, cracking it open, and just gulped up some of the underlying custard with the shattered crust! "Mon Dieu! Magique!" Like I had said before - it tasted like a dream!

But today's post is not just about this French dream of mine, experienced in one of the most 'Frenched-up' regions outside France! It is also about the Indian in me, and the inborn Desi love for Payasams and Halwas, delicately spiced with the finest ingredients from the Malabar Coast. I figured that we whip up some Masala Crème Brûlée to celebrate both. French in its origins but Indian at its soul, the Masala Crème Brûlée was ironically inspired by the Chai Tea Latte from the Starbuck's franchise on my College Campus!

MASALA CRÈME BRÛLÉE (Serves 2)
Set-up Time :  10 minutes

Experiment Run-Time : 40 minutes

The Shopping List

          Set 1: For the Custard
          Heavy Cream : 1 Cup
          Egg Yolks : 2 Large
          Sugar : 4 Tbsp
          Vanilla Essence : 1 Tbsp

          Set 2: Spice Rack
          Cardamom : 2
          Cinnamon : 1 inch stick
          Cloves : 2-3

         Set 3: Caramel Crust
         Sugar : 1.5 tbsp

Methodology

1. Carefully break the two eggs into a bowl and separate the yolks into a dry mixing bowl. There are several easy methods to separate the yolk, depending on the final product. Meringues and Macarons require pure egg whites, with not even a speck of the yolk, so the separation has to be super meticulous. Custards, Cakes, Ice-Creams, and Crème Brûlée are not as stringent in their yolk requirements, and a little white here and there does not spell disaster.This time, I simply used a spoon to lift out the thick yolks away from the whites, with considerable ease and success.

A little practice goes a long way here. I am now an expert at separating eggs using spoons and sometimes with just the palsm of my hands, using the gaps between the fingers as a sieve to let the more fluid white flow out.

2. Add sugar to the egg yolks and whip them at medium speed until the sugar is completely dissolved in the yolks, resulting in a smooth pale yellow mixture.

I skipped using a whisk of any sort and instead, used a fork to whip them together.

3. In a thick-bottomed pan, add the cream and heat it up.

Throw in the spices from Set 2, and bring the cream to a simmer. 

Keep an eye on the cream at all times and take it off the heat once it starts simmering. Else, all hell breaks lose and you might rather start again.

4. Discard the whole spices using a sieve. (It is so sad to throw away these beauties, but their duties have all been done!)

Use some of the hot cream to temper the yolks by pouring in a few tablespoons of the cream into the yolk-mixture while constantly beating it. This prevents the yolks from instantly curdling when adding them into the hot cream.

5. Add the tempered yolk-mixture back into the hot cream and mix them well. Add the Vanilla and divide the mixture between two ramekins. (I had picked up these dainty ramekins at Kroger, at very reasonable prices that too.)

6. Place the ramekins in a baking pan and fill the pan with hot water until it reaches half-way up the sides of the ramekins. This arrangement is called a Bain-Marie, and it ensures moist texture and even cooking within the oven.

7. Pre-heat the oven to 320 °F and place the Bain-Marie with the custard ramekins into the oven for 30 minutes. The custard is done when the mixture is firm at the sides but a teeny-weeny bit wobbly at the center. Carefully, remove the ramekins from the Bain-Marie. 

The custard, at this stage, is good enough to eat by iteslf!

8. Sprinkle the sugar from Set 3 evenly over the two ramekins. 

First tap the sugar around the ramekins as you hold it tilted slightly towards you. Turn the ramekins while tapping to ensure a thin even layer of sugar all over the custard's surface.

Now, tap off the excess sugar and return the ramekins to the baking pan without the water.

9. I did tell you that the waitress used a gun-like device to caramelize the sugar, but since not all of us happen to have a kitchen torch (which is the name that the device actually went by) at our reach, I resorted to a different method.

10 Place an oven rack as close to the top of the oven as possible and turn on the 'Broil' mode. Place the ramekins under the broiler and keep the oven door cracked open with the help of a wooden ladle. About 3-5 minutes should do the trick. Carefully, and I mean very carefully, take out the ramekins and you should see that the sugar has been beautifully caramelized. 

11. Allow the Crème Brûlée to come to room temperature before the final attack with a good friend, spouse, parent or sibling.

The Masala Crème Brûlée was gone in two eye-blinks. Actually, one eye-blink, if you count just the first one and me! Each mouthful was an experience and each swallow, an un-quenching desire for more, until I had clean-wiped out one entire ramekin. I am sure going to try making some other fusion versions of this classic French dessert, but whether its soul will be as Desi as this, is to be seen! Until then, Au Revoir!

Come, take a bite!

Vanilla/Mocha Meringues - Some French Miracles!

So, last week, I took up a sort of unofficial decision, that I would bake something new every weekend. It could be anything, from something as simple as a cookie to something as elaborate as a multi-tier cake. Yes, it is going to be a hassle, and yes it is going to take a toll on my diet, but hey! Why are friends there for? One Whatsapp message and you have a clean tray 30 minutes later. So I get the double satisfaction of baking an exciting dish and still keeping to the limits of my latest diet-fad.

Last Saturday, I went to bed at 4:30 in the morning and got up at 9:30. Having no mood to go to the university, I decided that it would be the ideal time to bake, as none of my room-mates were at home either. A quick scroll through some famous and not-so-famous cooking sites, and presto, project for the day - Meringues. They are similar to our Thoothukudi Macaroons without the cashews, with a uniform crispness throughout, and are an integral part of French and Swiss cuisine. For around half an hour, I was carried off by the chemistry behind meringue formation and totally forgot that I was looking to cook a dish and not teach advanced courses on protein denaturing and stabilization. Nevertheless, it did not take me too long to notice that in each of these blogs, the notes/tips following the recipes were larger than the recipes themselves. The list of do's and don't's, common mistakes and suggestions to volumize the egg-whites are long enough to fill separate chapters. But again, what dare discourages an ardent experimenting cook?  None but the self!

At the end of the day, after an hour of egg-beating and piping out pretty patterns and another two hours of baking, I had around 90 meringues on hand, half of them vanilla flavored and the rest mocha flavored. Three hours later, they were gone, equally shared between seven eager tummies! And it was not hard at all!

VANILLA/MOCHA MERINGUES (serves 7-8)
Set-up Time :  45 minutes

Experiment Run-Time : 2 hours

The Shopping List

          Set 1: Meringue Base
          Eggs : 4 large
          Salt : A pinch
          Confectioner's Sugar : 3/4 cup

          Set 2: Flavoring

          Vanilla Essence : 2 tsp
          Cocoa Powder : 3 Tbsp, Dutch Processed
          Nescafé Instant Coffee Powder : 1 Tbsp

Methodology

1. The first and the most important step in making Meringues is to get pristine egg-whites. Not a drop of yellow yolk. Chemically, the fats in the yolk hinder the formation of stiff peaks. Therefore, the greatest care is used to obtain the whites. I usually crack a small hole on the top end of the egg and pour out the whites gently, retaining the yolk within the shell. Sometimes, I break the egg onto a plate and use an empty plastic bottle to suction out the yolk. Either way, make sure you get only the whites of the four eggs into a large mixing bowl.

2. Add the salt to the egg whites and start to whisk the whites with an electric beater at medium speed. The salt helps to stabilize the peak formation. Many people use cream of tartar or vinegar for the same purpose but that may give a funny taste to the meringues, so I stuck with salt. Continue to whist the whites until it forms soft foamy peaks. It usually takes about five minutes.

3. This step is a very good test to measure your patience. Once the foamy peaks are formed, start adding the sugar, one teaspoon at a time, whisking for about 10-15 seconds between each addition. You have to make sure every batch of sugar is completely dissolved before the next is added. 

As you proceed you will see the mixture increasing in volume because of the air being incorporated by the whisking process. Continue till the entire 3/4 cup of sugar is done. Beat continuously until stiff peaks are formed when you remove the whisk from the batter.

4. Now add the vanilla essence and whisk for an additional 30 seconds. Divide the meringue into two equal portions.

5. To the second portion of the meringue mixture, add the cocoa powder and coffee powder in small increments until they are well incorporated and stiff peaks are formed. At this stage, it is very tempting to take some meringue and taste it. Go ahead and indulge - a little raw egg whites did no one any harm! 

6. Now comes the next testing part. Line two baking trays with aluminum foil and grease it up with very little butter. Fill the meringue mixture into an icing cone or a small ziploc bag with a nipped tip. With the help of a star shaped nozzle, pipe out small meringues directly onto the tray. I used a cupcake decorating set gifted by a friend and reduced the mess substantially. Each tray could accommodate about 45 meringues.

7. Preheat the oven to 200 °F and place the meringue trays into the oven. Bake undisturbed for 1.5 hours or until the meringues are hard to touch. I browned the white macaroons a little but try not to do so. They are supposed to remain as white when they come out as when they went into the oven.

8. Cool the muffins on a wire rack for fifteen minutes and carefully pick them off the tray. They are sticky little monsters and refuse to come off the baking trays without a little fight, but never give in.

9. Store them in airtight containers and serve with some hot chocolate for some evening fun! 

Airy, crunchy, and super yummy, the meringues were undoubtedly a success. So much so that I have already done sufficient research into other possible flavorings that may be incorporated. Care has to be taken so as to not use too much of oil-infused flavorings as they would impede the stiff peak formation. Right now, I have strawberry, pistachio, mango, dark chocolate and several other ideas in my little head. Research is also on to find the best recipe to duplicate the perfect Thoothukudi Macaroon. After all, it is just one step further than these meringues. But for now, you can try this super simple recipe and bask in the meringue's crunchiness, without going anywhere near Paris.