Desserts Codexery

Creme brulee

A custard dessert with a caramelized sugar topping.

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Creme brulee

Takeaway · via Wikipedia: Crème brûlée · CC BY-SA 3.0

Crème brûlée is a dessert consisting of a rich custard base topped with a layer of hardened caramelized sugar, also known as burnt cream, Cambridge burnt cream, or Trinity cream.[1] It is virtually identical to crema catalana.[1] The dessert is usually served in individual ramekins.[2]

Key facts and history

François Massialot's 1691 cookbook Cuisinier royal et bourgeois contains the first known recipe for a dessert called crème brûlée, though where it originally came from is not known.[3] La Varenne's 1651 Cuisinier françois already recorded the technique of browning dishes with a hot iron, used on custards like Oeufs au laict and Oeufs à la crème, as well as non-custard items, but none of these had a hard caramel layer on top.[4] The 1702 English translation of Massialot's cookbook used the term "burnt cream" for this dish.[5] During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, crème brûlée appeared only rarely in French and English cookbooks.[6]

The dessert saw a huge surge in popularity during the 1980s, likely driven by Sirio Maccioni at his New York restaurant Le Cirque.[6] From France, the dessert also spread to various parts of Asia.[7]

What the cited sources add

A 2012 Guardian article by Felicity Cloake notes that dairy is the key ingredient of crème brûlée.[8] Cloake reports that using demerara sugar for the topping gives a distinctive burnt toffee flavour and stays nicely crunchy.[8] Cloake states that using a blowtorch is much easier to control the heat for caramelizing than a grill.[8] Cloake observes that if using a grill, the brulees may need to be put back in the fridge for half an hour before serving to cool down again.[8]

References

  1. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Davidson, "The Oxford Companion to Food", OUP Oxford, 21 August 2014, p. 230; Andrews, "Catalan Cuisine, Revised Edition: Vivid Flavors From Spain's Mediterranean Coast", Harvard Common Press, 3 December 2005, p. 247– (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  2. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Cloake, "How to cook perfect creme brulee", The Guardian, 19 September 2012 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  3. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "The Oxford companion to sugar and sweets", 2015; Grigson, "Jane Grigson's British Cookery", Atheneum, 1 January 1985; Sabban, "La gastronomie au Grand Siècle : 100 recettes de France et d'Italie", Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 272 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  4. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: La Varenne, "Le cuisinier françois", 1651, p. 240, 241, 244, 120, 121; La Varenne, "Le cuisinier françois", 1651, p. 240, 241, 244, 120, 121 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  5. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: McGee, "On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen", Simon and Schuster, 20 March 2007, p. 97 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
  6. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "The Oxford companion to sugar and sweets", 2015; Andrews, "Catalan Cuisine, Revised Edition: Vivid Flavors From Spain's Mediterranean Coast", Harvard Common Press, 3 December 2005, p. 247–; Sax, "Classic Home Desserts: A Treasury of Heirloom and Contemporary Recipes", Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 9 November 2010, p. 149– (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  7. Wikipedia, "Crème brûlée" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "The Oxford companion to sugar and sweets", 2015; Maccioni, "Sirio : the story of my life and Le Cirque", Wiley, 2004 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
  8. Cloake, "How to cook perfect creme brulee", The Guardian, 19 September 2012. facts only, no text reused. theguardian.com

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Crème brûlée (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.

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Sources

Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.

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