To Amélie Poulain they like simple things. Bounce the pebbles along the Saint-Martin Canal, put your hand in a bag full of vegetables and, above all, break the crust of the crème brûlée with the spoon. The "burnt cream", in fact, is its favorite dessert as well as a symbol of Fabulous world of Amélie, the masterpiece of Jean-Pierre Jeunet of 2001 that tells the adventures of a young maid of Montmartre, of a good soul that seeks only to make others happy.
The origin
The first trace of the crème brûlée in history dates back to the end of the seventeenth century, documented in a French cookbook. In the first nomenclature it seems that the sweet, to the detriment of what seems, is not of French origin, but English. In fact, in the recipe book, the cream is called "crème anglaise", an English cream, suggesting a paternity of British origin. The sweet, in England, is mainly associated with the tradition of Trinity College of Cambridge that, since 1979, prepares it by imprinting, on the crust, the coat of arms of the school, forged with a special red-hot iron. A common mistake, then, is to confuse the crème brûlée with the Catalan cream that, unlike the first, is prepared on the stove and not cooked in a bain-marie. Another difference is the use of cream, which the Catalan cream replaces with a whole milk with a fat percentage of 3.5%.
Preparation
The crème brûlée does not need too flaccid preparation. First of all, to cook it you need 6 egg yolks, 3 tablespoons of sugar, a lemon peel, 600 ml of cream and 6 tablespoons of brown sugar. After having beaten the reds with the sugar in order to obtain a white cream, bring the cream to a boil for about 30 seconds and then add it to the previously whipped yolks. Then pour the cream into a clean pot, adding the yellow part of the lemon peel and then bring it to a boil, making sure that you do not stop stirring until the cream has thickened. Once the lemon is removed, pour the mixture into the appropriate earthenware bowls or into a round baking dish, and allow to cool for at least 6 hours. Two hours before serving, sprinkle with brown sugar, which you will caramelize with the appropriate round iron. In the absence of the latter, put the cream almost in contact with the oven grill so that the sugar dissolves in a few seconds. You may need to turn the bowls or baking dish so that the caramel is homogeneous, but it all depends on the grill in question. Only after this operation will create the famous caramelized crust that, in the film, Amélie broke with a teaspoon.