Crème Brûlée in Two Ways (2)

So, here is the second way of crème brûlée. The following recipe has most of the elements found in a traditional crème brûlée - soft custard and crispy sugar on top, but in a different arrangement.


Second,
Crème Brûlée
Non-conventional style

(Yield: 4 servings / Cooking time: three hours*)
*Cooking time includes custard cooling time two hours

Ingredients:
+ 1/2 cup of sugar
+ 1 Tbsp water
and the rest is same as recipe for Traditional crème brûlée which was posted previously.

Procedures:
Follow all the procedures from the previous crème brûlée posting up to #9.
The following procedures are to make a sugar dome. Please follow the instruction carefully. Sugar is cooked to higher than 230°F (110°C) and will stick to skin, and can be very DANGEROUS. Please try not to cook sugar when you have children around you.

10. Oil lower side of a ladle which will become a mold for your sugar dome. You can use any neutral oil which doesn't have a distinctive flavor or fragrance, such as canola oil or grape seed oil. (Not olive oil)


11. In a small pot, pour 1/2 cup of sugar (granulated white sugar) and add 1 table spoon of cold water. Heat over medium heat. The sugar will start melting and bubbling. Actually it is better to use stainless steel or white enamel pan for caramel because it will make easy for you to see the color changes in sugar.



12. Prepare a pastry brush and ice water (a cup of water with a few ice cubes inside). When the sugar starts bubbling, it begins crystallizing, especially on the side of the pot. You need to brush off the side of the pot continuously with wet pastry brush (with ice water) to prevent the sugar from being crystallized. (Please compare the picture below with one above. You can see that the small dots (crystallized sugar) on the side of the pot have been removed.)


13. When the sugar starts caramelizing (turning to brown), swirl the pot to caramelize the sugar evenly. Prepare a pot of ice water. As soon as the sugar reaches 280°F (138°C), turn off the heat and deep the pot of cooked sugar in an ice water pot. Bubble will set calm.


14. Before the sugar starts to solidify, spoon out the sugar and cover the back of oiled ladle as shown below. (When the sugar reaches 280°F (138°C), the sugar starts separating into threads. If the temperature is too lower, the threads are not going to be harden enough, and if the temperature is too higher the sugar will drop down from the spoon not forming threads.)


15. Carefully take out the sugar dome from ladle.


16. By using cookie cutter which has about the same width with your sugar dome, mold out cooked custard which was set in a refrigerator for a few hours. The custard is very smooth. Please be careful not to smush the custard!


17. Place the custard into a serving plate and decorate the top with some berries.


18. Unmold the custard carefully and cover the custard with the sugar dome.


Enjoy~