I'm always excited when there's a dish in my head that I've been wanting to do for a while and then someone comes along and asks me to write a recipe that fits perfectly with the recipe in my head. This is just one of those recipes!

As someone who doesn't eat refined sugar, I've always been excited by the common inclusion (in Vermont at least) of maple creme brulee on fancy restaurant menus. And then I've always been sad that the sugar they "brulee" (i.e. burn) is the regular table sugar that my insides don't agree with. And they already added the sugar to the top of every prepared custard, so I can't even just get maple custard.

Prior to developing this recipe, I had never had creme brulee. It always enticed and intrigued me, but I could never eat the sugar on top. I always felt like it could be made with maple sugar, but that was never offered in restaurants and pre-weight loss me really shouldn't have eaten the maple sugar anyway (even though I occasionally came up with some really valid sounding excuses for why I could, just this one time). But maple sugar is one of the many delicious things my post-weight loss pancreas can handle, so a maple sugar maple creme brulee has gotten back on my radar screen in recent months.

So, when the manager of the Montpelier Farmers Market emailed me to ask if I had a good maple recipe for this week's market newsletter, I jumped on the chance. And oh my, did I just fall down a high calorie rabbit hole of deliciousness (and if you don't mind, I might just hang out down here for a while).

Creme brulee is way easier than many restaurants make it seem. My experience in the food world has taught me that most savory chefs are terrified of the sweet kitchen, so if you see a dessert that even a chef will make, you'll probably be able to handle it just fine. Creme brulee does take a little time, but it's largely unattended time. So you can be doing other stuff at the same time, or make the custard ahead and burn the sugar under the broiler in about 5 minutes right before you're ready to serve.

So, have fun with this one. And I won't even tell you what my new calorie counting app says is in this little indulgence...


Maple Crème Brulee

2 cups heavy cream
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 large egg
3 large egg yolks
1/3 cup maple syrup
4 tsp maple sugar

1) Preheat the oven to 325° F

2) Put the cream and vanilla into a small pan and, stirring occasionally, cook over medium high heat until the cream just starts to bubble.

3) In a medium bowl, beat the egg, egg yolks and maple syrup with a whisk until even. While whisking, slowly pour the hot cream into the egg mixture. Strain the egg and cream mixture into a large measuring cup with a spout (at least four cups).

4) Place the ramekins into a casserole dish and place the whole dish on the middle rack of the preheated oven. Pour the cream and egg mixture into each ramekin (it should just fill the ramekin). Then pour enough hot tap water into the casserole dish, so that the water reaches halfway up the side of the ramekins. Bake the custards in the water bath for about 40 minutes or until the custards still quivers when shaken, but has no liquid beneath the skin. Cool the custards in the fridge for 1 hour to three days.

6) When the custards are cool, turn on your oven broiler and evenly spread 1 tsp of maple sugar over each custard and place the custards on a cookie sheet. Move the oven rack to the highest location in the oven and put the sheet of custards under the broiler. The sugar will take about 5 minutes to burn, although broilers vary widely in intensity, so keep a careful eye on the crème brulees. The crème brulee is done when the maple sugar is a mix of light brown and black. Quick cool the crème brulees in the fridge for about one minute and then serve immediately.