Crème Brûlée

Method

1. infuse8 min
   cream + vanilla warmed, never boiled
   to steaming — the flan entry's custard discipline applies throughout: everything gentle, nothing boiled, and the vanilla blooming in warm fat
2. temper5 min
   yolks + 1/2 cup sugar + salt, cream streamed in
   yolks whisked with sugar until pale, then the warm cream in a thin stream with constant whisking — and strained through the fine-mesh sieve into a pouring jug, which catches the chalazae and any accidental scramble; the strain is the difference between silk and merely smooth
3. bake35 min
   300°F, ramekins in a water bath, until the wobble
   shallow ramekins filled, set in a pan, boiling water poured halfway up their sides — the bath caps the custard's temperature the way poaching caps an egg's — baked until the edges are set and a nudge makes the center shimmy as one piece; carryover finishes what the oven starts
4. rest210 min
   cooled, then refrigerated 3+ hours
   fully cold — the lid stage demands a cold custard beneath, because the torch's job is to burn sugar without warming what it sits on
5. caramelize4 min
   a thin even sugar coat, torched in circles
   a scant tablespoon of sugar rolled across each cold surface, excess tapped out, then the torch in slow circles until the coat melts amber and crackles as it cools — thin is the law: a thick coat burns outside before melting through. The crack of the first spoon is the entire dessert's contract, and it holds for about twenty minutes before the lid softens — brûlée waits for no table