My Favorite Dessert

I am not a huge sweets person. I would rather eat an extra serving of dinner than have dessert. But when it comes to flan, I'll skip all dinner and eat one servings of flan, two, three, maybe four. I am not kidding. If it wasn't for the fact that we had dinner guests come over and I had to serve six flans to everyone, I probably would have eaten them all myself.

If you have never had flan, it's a Spanish dessert with an egg custard baked with caramel at the bottom. Then when served, you turn it out of the baking dish and it's served caramel side up. The caramel will melt during baking and runs down the sides of the custard. You will need to chill the flan for hours before eating, so plan according!

Flan from The Joy of Cooking

serves 8

1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

2) Place in a small, heavy saucepan: 3/4 cup sugar. Drizzle evenly over the top: 1/4 cup water.

Over medium heat and without stirring, very gently swirl the pan by the handle until a clear syrup forms. It is important that the syrup clarify before it boils, so slide the pan on and off the burner as necessary. Increase the heat to high and bring the syrup to a rolling boil. Cover the pan tightly and boil for 2 minutes. Uncover the pan and cook the syrup until it begins to darken. Gently swirl the pan by the handle once again and cook the syrup until it turns a deep amber. Quickly pour the caramel into eight 6-oz custard cups or ramekins or a 2 to 2 1/2-quart souffle dish. Using a potholder, immediately tilt the cups or dish to spread the caramel over the bottom.

3) Whisk just until blended: 5 eggs or 4 large eggs & 3 large egg yolks (I went with the 5 eggs because I never end up using the egg whites), 3/4 cup sugar, 1/8 teas salt.

4) Heat just until steaming: 3 cups of whole or low fat milk (I used 2%)

5) Gradually whisk the milk into the egg mixture and stir gently until the sugar is dissolved. If you wish, strain the mixture through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl or large measuring cup. Stir in 3/4 teas vanilla.

6)Pour into the caramel-lined cups or dish. Bake in a water bath (a roasting pan that is large enough to accommodate the custards without touching each other. After arranging the custards in the pan, add enough scalding-hot tap water into the pan---I use my tea kettle for this---add enough water, so that it's 1/2 way up the sides of the custard dishes until firmly set in the center, 40 to 60 minutes for individual cups, 1 to 1 1/2 hours for a single dish. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours or up to 2 days. To unmold, loosen the edges with a knife and invert onto individual plates or a large plate. The plate for a large flan must be either broad or deep to catch all the caramel.