Desserts

Creme Caramel vs Creme Brulee

June 2, 2022 by Mesayla Weaver

Creme brulee is my absolute favorite dish and dessert to make in the whole world. The first time I tried it, I fell in love with its rich texture, heavy vanilla flavor, sugar crust that cracks with the tap of a spoon, and the almost soothing feeling I experience as I take in every bite. I can’t get enough of it and neither can my family. My sister and her boyfriend love it so much, in fact, that the day after they tried it, they asked me to make another serving for them and waited until midnight to dig into this creamy, beloved dessert. I have gone on to make it for my extended family on Thanksgiving and I am so excited to share this wonderful food with anyone who wants it.

Here are the aforementioned 13 creme brulee servings I made for my family on Thanksgiving! This was such a proud moment for me as a young cook and everything looks beautiful (if I do say so myself).

I normally visit a creme brulee recipe on Sally’s Baking Addiction to make the best custard and sugar topping I can, but while I was sifting through recipes to try for this blog post, I found Anna Olson’s renditions of creme brulee and creme caramel – and they are just as good as Sally’s version!

I had never heard of creme caramel until I watched Anna Olson’s videos, but given its similarities to the classic creme brulee, I figured it would be a great idea to make these dishes around the same time, taste them, and deliver my thoughts on both. Keep reading for a detailed review on Anna Olson’s sweet treats!
Disclaimer: I have made slight modifications to these recipes to make them easier to bake and save money on ingredients that can easily be substituted for others. Remember to always heat your creme brulee to an internal temperature of 170 degrees!

Anna Olson’s Creme Caramel

Anna Olson’s creme caramel is very easy to make. If directions are followed perfectly, the recipe yields a delightful, flan-like treat that resembles the look and taste of Japanese pudding. Here are some of the dish’s best qualities:
– It has an airy, refreshing taste and is delightfully sweet without tasting overwhelming
– It is chilled to perfection and every bite makes it the ideal dessert to have on a hot summer day
– Its texture and consistency are wonderfully jiggly, soft, and easy to chew
– It’s a great alternative if you want something potentially easier to make than creme brulee – or something different that’s just as easy!
– The instructions are very straightforward (just be mindful of cooking the creme caramel the way Anna Olson suggests in her video)
– The caramel topping is very simple to achieve – in fact, I used this method to make the topping of Anna Olson’s creme brulee. It’s easier than torching or broiling sugar and it offers the most satisfying crack I’ve ever seen when making and eating creme brulee
– It plates nicely and is crowd-pleasing

Anna Olson’s Creme Brulee

Anna Olson’s creme brulee recipe is just as delicious and easy to follow as her creme caramel recipe. It delivers a satisfying serving of vanilla flavor and is even silkier and smoother in texture and consistency than the average creme brulee. Here are some of the rendition’s best qualities:
– It plates beautifully
– The addition of vanilla bean paste/fresh vanilla bean stalk makes the taste of Anna Olson’s recipe even more flavorful
– Olson’s method of including four egg yolks and one whole egg does indeed make the custard very silky and smooth. Every bite is very pleasant and does not feel too dense or rich as she explains in the video
– I could easily use her method of making caramel to create a creme brulee topping that’s even more fun to crack than the standard broiled/torched method! Check out this video to see how many taps of a spoon it took me to reach the custard. (For our more experienced readers, I obviously used too much sugar when making the crust, but it made such a cool candy shell regardless)!

This round of creme brulee is easily the best I’ve ever made. Not only is the sugar topping more glossy than any of my creme brulee attempts, the custard also offered the perfect amount of richness and vanilla flavor. I will definitely be using Anna Olson’s recipe as my go-to in the future!

If I had to choose between these two recipes, I have to say Anna Olson’s creme brulee is the best, as well as my favorite. Perhaps my bias for creme brulee is showing, but this is a dessert that just has to be shared once you master it. Who could ask for anything better than cracking through a sugar topping to unveil a beautifully chilled and sweet custard? Give it a try yourself and share with us your experience of making these creme caramel and creme brulee recipes! You might find yourself pleasantly surprised at how easy both are to make.

When Life Gives You Cake Mix, Make Cookies!

October 6, 2020 by Brittney Plaskett

Have you ever had a box of cake mix sitting in your pantry when you just don’t feel like eating a cake? I definitely have. I buy cake mix far more often than I’d like to admit, but I don’t use it for cake. I’ve never been a huge cake gal. Even at my wedding I chose to eat cookies instead of our $400 wedding cake. My favorite way to use cake mix then? Turn it into cookies! I love love LOVE turning cake mix into cookies. They come out so soft and moist, it’s dangerous. My favorite this time of year is spice cake mix cookies. It was my parents wedding cake flavor and I’ve always been a fan of all things cinnamon.

Here are some flavor combination ideas:

Spice cake + cream cheese frosting + sprinkle of cinnamon on top (my personal fave!!)

Red velvet cake + cream cheese frosting

Funfetti cake mix + strawberry frosting

Devil’s food cake mix + chocolate frosting

For this recipe you’ll need:

1 box of cake mix in your preferred flavor

2 large eggs

1/3 cup of vegetable oil

1 container frosting of your choice (optional)

Preheat oven to 350° F (or 325° F if using a dark or nonstick pan)

In a medium bowl, combine your cake mix, eggs, and oil.

Refrigerate your dough for 10-15 minutes or until chilled.

Roll dough into 1-inch balls and place on a baking sheet.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until a knife comes out clean

Let cool until firm and transfer to a cooling rack.

Once completely cooled, frost and decorate according to your preference. Enjoy!

The Dreamiest, Chunkiest Chocolate Chunk Cookies You’ll Ever Make

April 17, 2020 by Brittney Plaskett

Since I’ve been home a lot more than usual and not going out to my favorite restaurants and bakeries, I’ve been cooking and baking much more often. I’ve also been watching new YouTube videos to try and fine tune some of my culinary skills. This last weekend, I made the dreamiest, chewiest, chunkiest chocolate chip cookies. These aren’t your average chocolate chip cookies.

Listen – these are BIG, soft, chunky, and oh so yummy. I followed the recipe from two of my new YouTube friends, Joshua Weissman and Babbish. They attempted to recreate the world-famous New York Levain Chocolate Chip Walnut Cookies. I opted to remove the nuts from my recreation, but I included them in the ingredients for those who prefer nuts in their cookies.

If you want to watch Josh Weissman’s video while you bake, it’s linked here. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1.5 cups cake flour
2 cups all-purpose flour
1.5 tsp kosher salt
2 teaspoons corn starch
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1.25 cups unsalted butter
1.25 cups light brown sugar
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
2 eggs
3 egg yolks
2 cups walnuts (optional)
2 4oz chocolate baking bars, semi-sweet
2 4oz chocolate baking bars, 60% cacao or darker

Note: Some helpful kitchen tools include a stand mixer and a kitchen scale but are not needed.

Directions:

Melt your butter. You can do this over the stove top or in the microwave. If you’re using the microwave, melt the butter in 15-second increments to ensure it does not burn. When it is completely melted, set to the side and let cool.

While butter is cooling, roughly chop your cholate bars. You should have a variety of sizes, some big, some small.

In a medium size bowl, combine the cake flour, all-purpose flour, kosher salt, corn starch, and baking soda. Whisk together.

If you’re using a stand mixer, use the whisk attachment to whisk together your light brown sugar and white granulated sugar on medium speed. As that is mixing, slowly stream in your butter and whisk until it is all nice and creamy.

Once your butter and sugar mixture is smooth, one at a time add two eggs followed by three egg yolks.

Once the eggs have been completely mixed in, switch to the peddle attachment (if using a stand mixer, otherwise mix with a wooden spoon), begin to add in your flour mixture. I found it best to slowly add in the flour rather than adding it all at once.

After the dough is mixed and smooth, add in the chocolate and nuts (if desired) and mix.

Once all the ingredients have been mixed in, chill the dough in the fridge for at least 45 minutes.

Now that your dough is chilly, you need to form tall, large balls of dough. Levain’s website says that their cookies are roughly 6-oz, so using a food scale, scoop our 6-oz balls of dough and form them into a tall ball. If they’re not tall, they’ll come out flat.

Next, line your baking sheet with parchment paper and arrange your balls of dough. Place no more than 6 balls on one sheet to prevent them from spreading out into each other. To get tall cookies, refrigerate your formed dough for another 25 minutes, however, you don’t NEED to do this step.

Once you’ve chilled your dough again (or not), place them in your oven set to 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 10-13 minutes or until lightly browned on the outside. (I personally like my cookies medium rare, so I take them out at 10 minutes and let them almost completely cool to solidify any gooey dough, but you can adjust the bake time based on your preference). Carefully slide the parchment paper off the baking sheet and lay cookies on a cooling rack. You’re going to want to reline your baking sheet with parchment paper each time you put more cookies in the oven. If you’re re-using the same baking sheet for multiple batches of cookies, be sure the sheet is fully cooled before placing a new batch of dough.

Once your cookies have cooled, grab a cup of milk and enjoy! Be sure to check out Binging with Babbish and Joshua Weissman for more recipe inspiration!

If You Don’t Like That, Then You Don’t Like King's Basketball

January 7, 2019 by SacFoodies

By Cheyenne Cameron-Pruitt
…and, in this case, the “that” is the Sacramento King’s official tequila sponsor, Milagro.
We had the opportunity (thanks Milagro!) to experience the King’s newly announced tequila sponsor during an awesome night filled with delicious food and drinks, once in a lifetime experiences and best of all, a W for the Kings!
We started off our night on the court, Swipa, Bogi and Giles were greeted by the smiling faces of these foodies (we’re pretty sure we were the night’s good luck charms!). Seeing the Kings up close and personal was such a fun experience that we will cherish forever.

After wishing the team luck and sending all the good vibes their way, we headed to the Milagro Tequila Bar on the Plaza level of the arena. Here you can find a slew of delicious libations featuring high quality ingredients and Milagro Tequila. One of the coolest things about the Sactown Margaritas is that they come in cups specially designed by three local artists!

The partnership between Milagro Tequila and the Sacramento Kings officially kicked-off with a local competition in September to choose the artwork for the SacTown Margarita Cup. With Milagro Tequila’s focus on local Mexican artists for content and the Kings’ emphasis on using local vendors, the two sought out to use Sacramento-based artists to bring a different element to the new Sactown Margarita. The three artists (Ernesto Cardens of SAVDESIGNS, Nick Jacoy aka Pasta Nick and Jason Vu of 13th Vision) had their designs featured in a campaign where fans voted on their favorite to be featured on the cup of the Milagro SacTown Margarita. The winner of the competition was Jason Vu of 13^th Vision.

You might be thinking to yourself, a marg is a marg, there’s nothing that special. But think again, like everything else on the Golden 1 Center menu, a lot of attention to detail went into creating the SacTown Margarita. Our favorite part is that there is an element of Sacramento in the ingredients! Orange Liqueur made with Sacramento Oranges, Margarita Mix from Preservation and Co. pair beautifully with Milagro Silver for a classic drink with a garnish of home. ?

We ended our night with a delicious dinner prepared by the Golden 1 Center’s executive chef. Each course from the salad to the dessert featured Milagro tequila. We still can’t get over how beautiful (and delicious) these margarita cupcakes were.

Milagro is the King’s Official Tequila partner for the next two seasons, which gives you plenty of time to give the SacTown Margarita a try

[Read more…]

A Fabulously Sweet Evening at Andy’s Candy Apothecary

March 8, 2016 by SacFoodies

You might have noticed that last month on SacFoodies we celebrated all things fabulous. Well, even though it’s now March, I have something really fabulous to share with you today. Call it fabulous, marvelous, something out of a dream, or whatever you’d like – you’re going to want to know about this.

Sarah Maren Photographers — Photo Courtesy of Sarah Maren Photography and Andy’s Candy Apothecary

Have you ever had a dream that you were one of the kids that got to tour Willy Wonka’s factory and play in his magical room filled with candy? You know, the one that has a chocolate river, whipped-cream filled mushrooms, trees with gummy leaves and numerous other sweet treats. Well I’m about to tell you that right here in Sacramento you can have an exclusive experience that will make those dreams come true.
After hours, Andy Paul of Andy’s Candy Apothecary, provides exclusive, curated tastings of some of the highest-quality confections available, all in the privacy of his gorgeous candy store. From old-timey sweets, to artisan chocolates, to unique treats (spicy and zesty tequila lime tortilla chip brittle, anyone?), he leads groups through tastings akin to a wine tasting with a skilled sommelier. Speaking of wine, Andy also encourages groups to bring in their favorite wines to enjoy with the treats. An evening filled with candy and wine, how bad can that be?

Photo Courtesy of Sarah Maren Photography and Andy’s Candy Apothecary

I can tell you from personal experience that it’s not bad at all – in fact, it’s pretty great! I recently had the pleasure of attending one of these exclusive candy and wine gatherings at Andy’s with a group of 10 of my friends, and we had an absolute blast. We enjoyed 17 different candies (you read that right!) and brought a selection of wines which we paired with the unique candies that we tasted. Andy guided us through the tasting, encouraging us to enjoy each piece of candy and think about the nuances of flavors and textures (these are not run-of-the-mill candies, so it’s truly worth savoring each bite).

The seemingly never-ending selection of candies to try, and the fact that we had the store all to ourselves, made me feel just like a kid in Wonka’s factory (without the fear of turning into a giant blueberry) and it was the perfect way to spend a Thursday night with friends.
All in all, we learned a lot, tasted some delicious treats and had a great time. I’m already thinking of excuses to do it again.
If you’re looking to do something fabulous, book yourself a private tasting at Andy’s Candy Apothecary. I promise it’ll be sweet!
For pricing and additional information on private tastings, click here.
Andy’s Candy Apothecary
1012 9th St.
916-905-4115
Hours: Monday-Saturday 10:30am-6pm; Sunday 11am-4pm