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Test Kitchen: Curried Pots de Crème
Curried Pots de Crème? Challenge accepted, chef Sosa.
Test Kitchen: Curried Pots de Crème
Angelo Sosa was in town over the weekend taking over the burners at Sbraga and testing out recipes from his newly released cookbook, Flavor Exposed: 100 Global Recipes from Sweet to Salty, Earthy to Spicy. Sosa concluded his $100 five-course meal with Curried Pots de Crème – that's right, curried. Am I the only one who did a double-take when I read that? Although it sounds terribly gourmet, I was quite skeptical about how good a curried dessert could taste... Challenge accepted, chef Sosa.
The Recipe:
5 cardamom pods
1 cinnamon stick
¼ teaspoon cumin seeds
¼ teaspoon ground turmeric
1 ¼ cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
6 egg yolks
5 tablespoons sugar
Fresh cilantro leaves
1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2. In a small skillet over low heat, lightly toast each of the spices, one at a time starting with the largest and adding them to the pan in order of decreasing size; be sure to end with the ground turmeric. Cool the spices thoroughly before grinding them to a fine powder in a spice grinder. Set aside.
3. In a medium saucepan, bring the milk and cream to a boil over medium-high heat.
4. In a large bowl, whisk the yolks until well combined. Add the sugar and the reserved curry powder. Add the milk and cream to the egg mixture a bit at a time (this is called tempering) – you don't want the hot milk to cook the eggs. Combine well.
5. Transfer the custard to six 4-ounce ramekins. Place the ramekins in a roasting pan and carefully add enough hot water to the pan to come halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Bake for 30 to 45 minute, until just set. Remove the ramekins from the water and let cool on a rack. Garnish with the cilantro, and serve.
The Good Part:
Even though it's easier to dip a teaspoon into a jar of store-bought ground spices, toasting and grinding whole cardamom, cumin seeds and a cinnamon stick heightened the fragrance of the curry powder, and brought it up to the next level. I didn't have a spice grinder, so I hand-ground them using a mortar and pestle. It took forever, but it was worth it.
The Bad Part:
Toasting the spices took about 30 minutes at low heat, which was quite irritating for an impatient cook like myself. I suggest starting on low to see how hot your stove gets, and then bumping the heat up to medium-low if they spices take more than 5 minutes to become fragrant.
The directions for step 4 are not explicitly clear on how to add in the sugar, milk and cream to the egg mixture. I used a whisk which created a lot of foam, so I would suggest using a spoon for tempering the mixture. If the custard does get foamy, skim the foam off the tops of the ramekins with a small spoon. I didn't do this and the pot de crème still tasted fine, it just looked a little strange.
The I-can't-decide-whether-this-is-good-or-bad Part:
The spices ended up sinking to the bottom of the ramekin, making the final bites way overloaded with chunks of spice. The thing is, I don't necessarily want to be chewing on all of those ground-up spices with each bite. Since they sank to the bottom, the rest of the pot de crème was silky smooth without any spice chunks, while still being super-charged with the curry flavor. So think I would elect to just skip the bottom next time.
The Verdict:
To be honest, I did not have high hopes for this dessert, but I have found that I was pleasantly mistaken. It doesn't taste the least bit like a savory curry (which is what I was expecting) probably because cardamom, which came through strongly, is used often in Indian desserts. The richness of the cream and milk doesn't dim the complex flavors of the homemade curry powder. But with only 5 tablespoons of sugar, it wasn't overly sweet either. Well done, chef Sosa.
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