Earl Grey Crème Brûlée (single serving)

It's creamy, silky smooth, a rollercoaster of delectable texture with that perfectly crisp burnt sugar top, and the perfect pairing of flavors-- this earl grey crème brûlée is a must!

Why single serving dessert recipe?

One of my all time favorite kinds of recipes to develop and work on perfecting is my single serving recipes! I sometimes call them “single girl” recipes! I’m a single girl. I live by myself and while I love making recipes that can serve 4-6 or even 8-10; and being able to share my bakes with friends and family, sometimes I just want to bake something because I have a very specific craving. I want to bake the perfect portion and be left with zero leftovers.

Sometimes the satisfaction of only using a single egg and not wasting any ingredient, and eating up every last bite of something you’ve made perfectly is hard to beat.

Earl Grey Crème Brûlée

I’ve long loved earl grey tea with its deep a robust tea flavor, rounded and malty, with bright notes of citrus. A tea that pairs so wonderfully with milk and cream. Mostly, I enjoy a strong cup of earl grey with a splash of milk or cream and some sugar. But ever since I started enjoying the flavor in desserts like macarons, ice cream, and infused into buttercream and slathered over cake, I cannot get enough of it!

Crème Brûlée is SO EASY to make!

It’s one of those desserts that always incites a crowd of “wow’s” and “mmMMm’s” but did you know that it’s also one of the easiest and fastest desserts to make?! And it’s not a dessert that requires some special set of skills of years of developing the correct techniques.

Yes, there are a few very helpful and tips and tricks, but it’s still considered and absolutely easy piece of cake level dessert that you should definitely whip out to impress anyone and everyone!

Earl Grey Crème Brûlée (single serving) Recipe

Ingredients

2/3 cup (160g) heavy cream
pinch of salt
one bag earl grey tea leaves (about 3g)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg yolk
2 tablespoons (25g) granulated sugar

more granulated sugar for topping later
fresh berries for garnish (optional)

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F and place about 4-5 cups of water to boil. Set hot water aside.

2. To a small saucepan, add heavy cream, salt, earl grey tea leaves, and vanilla extract. Stir to combine ingredients. Place over medium low heat and heat until cream reaches JUST a simmer. DO NOT let it come to a boil.

3. Turn off the heat and cover to let tea steep for about 5 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, whisk egg yolk and sugar together very well until yolk is a bit paler in color. Set aside.

5. Pour the warmed cream/tea through a fine mesh sieve and discard the tea leaves.

6. SLOWLY stream about 1/2 of the warmed cream into the egg yolk/sugar while whisking quickly. This will temper the egg yolk and prevent scrambling the egg. Pour in the rest of the cream and whisk to combine.

7. Pour entire mixture through a fine mesh sieve to get rid of lumps or extra bubbles. This helps achieve a smoother finish.

8. For a single serving, pour mixture into a 10 oz shallow ramekin. (I only had 8 oz ramekins handy and didn’t want to risk overfilling/spilling, so I divided mine in the photos into two ramekins.. don’t worry, I still ate it all up all by myself! OR, this could make for the perfect two-person dessert as well.)

9. Place the ramekin(s) into a larger baking pan and fill the baking pan with about 1/2 inch of the just boiled water (careful to not splash any water into the custard mixture).

10. VERY CAREFULLY, with oven mitts, transfer entire baking tray into the preheated oven. Bake for about 30-35 minutes. Baking times will vary depending on size of the ramekins and whether you made a single or double. If you baked in one 10-12oz ramekin, it will take longer. To check for doneness, wiggle the baking tray slightly— edges should be set while the center has a slight jiggle.

11. Remove from oven, then remove ramekin from the larger baking pan. Let cool completely before transferring to fridge to cool for at least 4 hours or overnight.

12. Right before serving, sprinkle a thin layer of sugar evenly on top. With a kitchen torch, brûlée the sugar until a nice dark golden brown. Top with some fresh fruits and enjoy immediately! The top won’t stay crisp for long so I like to serve right away!