Crème brûlée is a silky smooth custard that is actually quite simple to make however, it does require some finesse. Crème brûlée literally means “burnt cream”. The main ingredients are sugar, cream, egg yolk, and vanilla. The star feature of the crème brûlée is the crackly burnt sugar on the top.

The 3 countries that claim the originality of the crème brûlée are England, Spain, and France. Long ago in England during the 15th century there were similar desserts topped with burnt sugar. Going further back to the medieval times, Spain had its own version. ¹ The very first recorded recipe for a crème brûlée was printed in the 1691 edition of a French cookbook by François Massialot. The author was a cook at the Palace of Versailles.²

In the United States, according to author Thomas J. Craughwell and his book, in the 1780s Thomas Jefferson was responsible for serving the crème brûlée as a dessert in the White House.³ There are cookbooks from the early 1900s that contained versions of the crème brûlée but it did not reach its real popularity until the 1980s when a high end restaurant located in New York City, Le Cirque, added it to their menu.

You can pretty much find crème brûlée anywhere these days. There are many countless ways to dress it up and change the flavor. I love a classic crèmè brulee which is what I’m sharing here.