Creme Brulee Cupcakes

Crème Brulee Cupcakes ~ Crème brulee nested inside a chocolate cupcake- Wow. Forget death by chocolate, how about death by cupcake. This is a killer combination.

These babies were set to debut this week on the blog (as it is now) and at my girlfriend’s now cancelled wedding.

I was so excited when I thought of these cupcakes, thinking I was so clever and original. Then I put my Crème Brulee Cupcake to the Google test for originality, I was quickly humbled. What I thought was an original idea, is not. If you type in Crème Brulee Cupcake, you’ll see it’s everywhere.

What you will also see is, most of these recipes fill the cupcake hole with Swiss or regular buttercream and then brulee it.

Well my friends, allow me to be a picky foodie for a moment, but that’s not my traditional understanding of crème brulee. I wanted the Real McCoy not burnt sugar on frosting.

With that came the test runs.

The first  run yielded a baked soggy mess. I tried to short cut the process by combining the cake batter and the custard mixture. Now before you shake your head at me and say, “Duh”. Let me preface by saying, I thought the water bath would slow the bake time of the cake batter to the same rate as the custard-wrong!

The second time around, I baked the cupcake half way through and then added the custard and then placed the cupcake pan in a water bath to finish the process. Can you say “ hot sunken mess”. That was way too much time for the cupcakes to be out of the oven then back in the oven.

The third time really does always work out to be a charm for me. Based on the previous failures I decided the best way, like most stuffed cupcakes, was to make the components separately.

With that, everything came together and these Crème Brulee Cupcakes moved from test to pass. It’s just too bad the wedding has been cancelled.  I was really hoping to try these out on a larger audience.

If anyone gives these Crème Brulee Cupcakes a go, please let me know what you think.

A few notes:
1. If you have vanilla beans, use them by scraping 1 vanilla bean pod clean. I didn’t have any so I used vanilla bean paste which I find to be much more flavorful than vanilla extract. If you don’t have either bean or paste, vanilla extract will work just fine.
2. When removing the ramekins from the water bath, make sure to tie  rubber bands around the end of the tongs for better gripping.
3. The custard can be made four days in advance or you can assemble and refrigerate the custard filled cupcakes one evening before and brulee the top 1 hour prior to serving.
4. Sprinkle your demera sugar on one cupcake at a time, otherwise the sugar starts to melt from the condensation of the cold custard and you won’t be able to brulee it. You need the sugar to stay solid for it to burn.

Crème Brulee Cupcakes

Heat oven to 300 degrees and prepare water bath. Place kitchen towel on bottom of a roasting pan or cake pan.  Place one ramekin in the pan to determine the water level. The water needs to be two thirds the height of the ramekin. Bring determined water amount to boil while assembling the custard.

Ingredients:

Custard:
1  teaspoon vanilla bean paste or 1 ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups heavy cream, chilled
½ cups sugar
5 large egg yolk (room temperature)
8-10 teaspoons Demera sugar

INSTRUCTIONS:

Custard:

1. Combine and bring vanilla paste, 1 cup of the cream, granulated sugar, and salt to a boil over medium heat. Stir every now and then to prevent the cream from forming a skin.  Once boiled, remove the pan from heat and let steep for 15 minutess.
2. After the mixture has steeped, stir in the remaining cup cream to cool down the mixture.
3. Whisk the egg yolks together in a large bowl until uniform. While whisking eggs with one hand use your other hand to slowly pour in the cream mixture. Make sure your cream has cooled enough so that your eggs will not curdle. Push final mixture through a fine mesh strainer, discarding any solids. Pour into the ramekins.
4. Place custard filled ramekins into pan.
5. Pour boiling water into pan, being careful not to splash water into ramekins.
6. Bake for approximately 30-35 minutes or until custard either reads 170 degrees and/or until custards gives a gentle wiggle when moved.
7. Transfer baked ramekins to cooling rack. Cool to room temperature for approximately 2 hours.
8. To store, place plastic wrap directly on custard surface to prevent skinning.

Magnolia’s Chocolate Cupcakes
Makes 2 dozens

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line two 12 cup muffin pans.
Ingredients:

Cupcakes:

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
4 large eggs, at room temperature
6 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted (*see  note)
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Note: To melt the chocolate, place in a double boiler over simmering water on low heat for approximately 5–10 minutes. Stir occasionally until completely smooth and no pieces of chocolate remain. Remove from the heat and let cool to lukewarm 5–10 minutes.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Cupcakes:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Line two 12-cup muffin tins with cupcake papers. Set aside.
3. In a small bowl, sift together the flour and baking soda. Set aside.
4. In a large bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, cream the butter until smooth. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the chocolate, mixing until well incorporated. Add the dry ingredients in three parts, alternating with the buttermilk and vanilla. With each addition, beat until the ingredients are incorporated, but do not overbeat. Using a rubber spatula, scrape down the batter in the bowl to make sure the ingredients are well blended and the batter is smooth. Carefully spoon the batter into the cupcake liners, filling them about three-quarters full. Bake for 20–25 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted in the center of the cupcake comes out clean.
5.Cool the cupcakes in the tins for 15 minutes. Remove from the tins and cool completely on a wire rack before filling with custard.

Assembly:
1. Using a paring knife cut a shallow cone from the top of the cupcake.
2. Fill hole with custard.
3  Generously sprinkle  Demera sugar on top of custard.
4. Keep torch six inches from sugar to brulee.