Crema Catalana

Pour 550 ml of the milk into a saucepan, keeping the remaining 150 ml back in a jug.

💡 That reserved cold milk is not a detail — it is what lets you make a lump-free slurry in the next step.

Add the strip of lemon peel, the strip of orange peel and the cinnamon stick to the pan and heat it over medium heat until it just comes to the boil.

💡 Peel the citrus with a vegetable peeler and take only the coloured layer. Any white pith turns the cream bitter.

Take the pan off the heat and let the peels and cinnamon steep in the hot milk while you prepare the yolks.

In a large bowl, whisk together the 20 g of cornflour, the 80 g of sugar and the reserved cold milk until completely smooth.

💡 Whisk the cornflour into cold liquid, never hot. Hot liquid seizes starch into lumps you can never whisk out.

Add the 6 egg yolks to the bowl and whisk everything together well until the mixture is even and pale.

Strain the hot infused milk through a sieve into the bowl, catching the peels and cinnamon, and whisk as you pour.

💡 Pour slowly and keep whisking. Tipping hot milk onto yolks all at once scrambles them on contact.

Pour the whole mixture back into the saucepan and set it over low heat.

Cook for 6–8 minutes, stirring without stopping, until the cream visibly thickens and coats the back of the spoon.

💡 Stir into the corners of the pan too. Custard catches at the edges first, and one scorched patch flavours the whole batch.

Take it off the heat as soon as it thickens. It will firm up considerably more as it cools.

💡 Over-cooked cornflour custard goes gluey and can split. Thick enough to coat a spoon is thick enough — stop there.

Divide the cream between 4 shallow dishes and level the surfaces.

💡 Wide and shallow, not deep. Crema catalana is meant to be mostly caramel and cream in the same spoonful.

Let them cool to room temperature, then chill them until cold and set.

Just before serving, sprinkle 1 tablespoon of sugar evenly over each dish, tilting them so the layer is thin and complete.

💡 Thin and even is everything. A thick pile of sugar melts into a bitter, chewy lump instead of a thin sheet of glass.

Burn the surface with a kitchen blowtorch, moving the flame steadily until the sugar bubbles, turns amber and stops smoking.

💡 Keep the flame moving. Holding it in one spot burns black bitter patches while the rest is still raw sugar.

Let the caramel set for a minute until it is hard enough to crack with a spoon, decorate with a few mint leaves and serve.

💡 Torch at the table if you can, and never before the guests arrive — caramel softens back into syrup within twenty minutes in the fridge.