What's Cooking: November 2009

An instructional video done by some cuisine-saavy Canadians was the inspiration for this dish. They explain the dish much better than I, and after watching it a couple of times, I made the dish without using a written recipe.

You need to plan ahead because the dessert needs to chill for at least a few hours.

You will need only five ingredients- milk, eggs (a lot of them), sugar, vanilla, and water. Notably, we used half measurements of the video's instructions, because my soufflé dish is smaller.

First, you start a half quart of milk on the heat - it should boil, but only slightly, with some small bubbles around the edges of the milk - not a rolling boil like you are making pasta. Put your milk on medium heat and watch it carefully.

Put about a half a cup of sugar (or 1 cup if you are following the video) into a pan and wet it - you don't want lots of water standing above the sugar.

Put the sugar and water (your future caramel) on medium-low heat. The caramel easily burns, so as soon as it turns a beautiful golden brown color, take it off the heat and swirl it in the air so that it does not burn.

Prepare a bain-marie (a water bath) in your oven. This is easy - find a dish that your soufflé dish will set into, set water to boil, and then pour boiling water into it - to a level that will surround your dish to the 1/3 point or so. The video makes this very easy to understand.

The oven should be at 400F. While your milk is heating and your caramel is bubbling, crack 6 eggs (or 12 if you follow the video) into a large bowl. Our eggs were from the farmer's market, so some of the yolks are a beautiful darker color and stand out from the others.

Temper your eggs with the milk (gradually add milk a few times and stir, so that you do not cook the eggs). Beat the eggs until white peaks form. Once the eggs are beaten, add a teaspoon or so of vanilla. I say "or so" because I love vanilla and usually add more.

Your caramel should be done (or maybe it was done already). Take it off the heat, and pour it into the bottom of your soufflé. Gently tip the dish around so that the caramel coats the bottom of the dish and about 1/4 of an inch on the sides.

Pour your egg mixture into the dish.

Place your soufflé dish into the bain-marie.

Close your oven:) Wait for an hour.
Put it in the refrigerator and be sure not to touch it for at least 4 hours. I waited 6.

Take out your beautiful crème caramel and sigh at its loveliness.

After this time, take out the dish and cut around the outside of it with a knife, place an upside-down plate on top of the dish, turn it over quickly onto the plate, being careful not to break the mold.

You should have a beautiful crème caramel.

Posted by Sara

Inspired by reading Julia Child's tales of fish-eating in France, (usually full of butter & white wine references) we decided to cook an experimental fish in similar style guided by intuition...yes, instead of a recipe.

You need: fillets of white fish of your choice, fresh lemon, parsley, garlic, white wine, butter, salt and pepper.

Steps: Warm butter in your pan and sear the fish so it is slightly brown on both sides. Remove the fish to a warm oven. Deglaze the fish pan with white wine. Add a bit more butter, lemon, and garlic to your taste. Simmer and reduce until it is the consistency you like for a sauce. Add salt and pepper to taste. Pour over the fish and garnish with parsley. We served the fish over Israeli couscous, but you could use a bed of greens or grain of your choice.

Our fish in the pan (you should have a bit less butter in searing than this picture shows)