Crème Brûlée Tartlets

We had a lot of egg yolks leftover after making so many macarons. We managed to use most of them for the lemon curd, but we still had another batch of yolks! So we tried to make crème brûlée, we've never made it before despite all the ramekins we have. But then we saw a recipe for Crème Brûlée Tartlets and thought we would give it a try!

To make the tart shells, we're tried a pâte sucrée recipe.

Pâte Sucrée
Recipe from The Seasonal Baker

2 cups of all-purpose flour
2 sticks of unsalted butter
1/4 cup of sugar
1 teaspoon of salt
1 egg
1 egg yolk

1. Using a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, sugar, and salt on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
2. Add the egg and egg yolk, mix until combined with the flour.
3. Shape the dough into a flattened disk and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate overnight.

Preheat your oven to 190°C (375°F). Take the dough out and sprinkle your work non-stick surface with flour. Not too much flour, you don't want to change the texture of the dough. Roll the dough out and fill your tart pans. Trim off any excess dough and roll it flat for the next pan. Prick the bottom of the tarts with a fork. Bake the shells for 15 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and crisp. Set aside.

Crème Brûlée

Recipe from Macarons

1 vanilla bean

1 cup of milk

1 cup of heavy cream

5 egg yolks

2/3 cup of granulated sugar

1. Preheat your oven to 125°C (255°F).
2. Split the vanilla bean in half lengthwise and scrape out the seeds.
3. In a saucepan, pour in the milk and vanilla seeds. Heat over medium temperature.
4. In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks and sugar until smooth.
5. When the milk begins to boil (watch it carefully, it can boil over), remove it from the heat and stir in the heavy cream. Pour in the yolks and whisk quickly to prevent the heat from cooking scrambled eggs!
6. Pour the mixture through a sieve. 

To our surprise, the pâte sucrée tart shells shrunk in the oven! They no longer had the height of the tart pans, which created a really shallow area for the crème brûlée. Some of the tarts could only hold a spoonful of filling. Well, we bake and we learn. Take out some ramekins for your extra custard!

Carefully ladle the custard into the tart shells and pop them back in the oven. Bake for another 15 minutes or until the custard sets. It will jiggle a little bit, but be careful not to over bake it, the custard will curdle! Remove the tarts from the oven and let cool. Refrigerate for an hour or overnight.

To create the signature crust over the crème brûlée, take some granulated sugar and sprinkle the surface. Make sure to do this when you take the tarts out from the fridge. You'll want them still cool, otherwise your kitchen torch will melt the crust.

Ignite your kitchen torch and move the flame evenly over the top of the tarts. Avoid the crust and stop when the sugar is caramelized. Serve immediately.

Oops, you can see that we burnt a bit of the crust and how shallow the tarts were! Next time, we're going to roll them thinner and let some of the dough hang over the tart pans.