For our Spanish dessert, Crema Catalana caught our eye. It is essentially a firm custard, with a burnt sugar crust on top, so gave us a great excuse to buy a blowtorch! This is definitely one we will be making again, as it keeps really well too.
A lot of the ingredients needed for this are already in the kitchen cupboard, making this an ideal dessert that doesn’t need too much planning. It does require an overnight rest though! We used a recipe recommended on Taste Atlas, originally from Crema Catalana Original, which was very straightforward and easy to follow.
The first step was to infuse the milk with the cinnamon and lemon flavours, allowing it to take in as much as possible before adding the egg yolks and cornflour mixture.
Side note, the egg whites are not used in this recipe, so make sure to check out other recipes so they don’t go to waste! BBC Good Food have a lot of great recommendations. You could also use the juice from the zested lemon to create a number of fun cocktails!
The most important part of the crema catalana is to make sure there are no lumps in the custard to keep everything as silky smooth as possible.
Once the final mixture is combined, thickened on the hob, and poured into the ramekins, it is ready to chill overnight.
Then it’s time for the fun bit! Time to cover the top of the crema with sugar (caster is best) and get ready to caramelise. This really was the part of the crema that gave it the edge into being a delicious dessert, and was a lot of fun.
This was a delicious end to Spain week and hopefully you will enjoy it too. Let us know if you give this a go – we’d love to hear from you!
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