The Kitchen · № 05

Crème anglaise, and the ice cream it becomes

Name: Crème anglaise, and the ice cream it becomes
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 1 h 10 min
Yield: 600 ml
Cuisine: French
Ingredients: 500 ml whole milk, for anglaise; or 250 ml milk and 250 ml double cream, for ice cream; 1 Ox & Orchid vanilla pod; 6 egg yolks; 100 g caster sugar; A pinch of fine salt

One custard, two dishes, and the fairest test there is of whether your vanilla is real.

Makes

600 ml

Prep

25 min

Steep

30 min

Set point

82 to 84°C

Where this comes from

Crème anglaise is the foundation stone: the vanilla custard under an île flottante, which Paul Bocuse served, and under most vanilla ice cream worth eating.

There is no author to credit here. It is the canon. Which is exactly why it is the honest test: there is nothing in it to hide behind.

The classical canon; île flottante, after Paul Bocuse

Ingredients

500 ml whole milk, for anglaise
or 250 ml milk and 250 ml double cream, for ice cream
1 Ox & Orchid vanilla pod
6 egg yolks
100 g caster sugar
A pinch of fine salt

Method

Split the pod and scrape the seeds. Warm the milk (and the cream, if you are making ice cream) with the pod and seeds to just below a simmer. Off the heat, cover, and steep 30 minutes.
Whisk the yolks, sugar and salt until pale. A minute, no more.
Rewarm the milk. Pour a third of it onto the yolks, whisking hard, then return everything to the pan.
Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly with a spatula in a figure of eight and reaching into the corners. Take it to 82 to 84°C. Without a thermometer: it is ready when it coats the back of the spatula and a finger drawn through leaves a line that holds.
Strain it immediately into a cold bowl. Do not walk away during the last step: 85°C is custard and 86°C is sweet scrambled egg, and the gap between them is about fifteen seconds.
For anglaise, chill and serve. For ice cream, chill it thoroughly, ideally overnight so it matures, then churn.

The grader’s note

This is the real-vanilla test, and it is worth doing once in your life. Make it twice: one with a bean, one with supermarket vanilla flavouring, and serve them side by side to someone who has not been told which is which. Nobody has ever needed a second taste. A good bean gives you seeds you can see and, more to the point, a finish that keeps going after you have swallowed. Flavouring stops.

Made with

Grade A Indonesian planifolia.

Every recipe here is written for a real bean: graded, signed, and sold by weight.

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