I had been adding recipes for a while to a new cookbook so I could find them when I wanted to cook them. In the electronic age, a digital version seems to make more sense, since I can add, amend, advise, adjust, delete, and reconsider as often as I want to and you can access them if and when you please. I've included the recipes from both my original cookbook which many of you have, and additional accumulated recipes that never got published. This isn’t the latest thing or nouvelle cuisine. These recipes are comfort food, good memories, treasured family recipes, and occasional treats as well as many healthier recipes I've grown to like in recent years. I encourage you to add comments, pictures, and favorite recipes to make this a real family cooking spot. It's the next best thing to sharing a meal.






Sunday, January 24, 2016

Cuban Flan

1 cup sugar
5 eggs
1 can sweetened condensed milk (whole or skim, whole is better)
1 cup milk (whole is better, but you can use skim)
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Place a damp dish cloth in the bottom of a pyrex baking pan (to ensure that the flan cooks evenly).  Fill the baking pan half way with water.  Pour the sugar into a sauce pan and melt (Cris says: "I burn it quickly because I like the bittersweet taste and the dark color, others (namely Tom) prefer an amber color.  This takes less heat, more stirring and more time.")  Either way watch it carefully and make sure that all the granules have melted so that you achieve the consistency of syrup.  Pour the sugar syrup immediately into an oven proof casserole dish or metal mold.  Coat the bottom and the sides of the dish with the sugar syrup.  Be carefully, this is extremely hot!  Place the casserole dish in the baking pan with water and allow the melted sugar to harden.

In a separate bowl, mix the rest of the ingredients, i.e., eggs, condensed milk, milk, and vanilla.  Pour this mixture into the casserole dish coated with sugar (after the sugar syrup has hardened).

Place the entire contraption--the baking pan (filled half way with water) containing the casserole dish with the flan mixture in it--into the preheated oven.  Bake 50 to 60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out moist, NOT WET.

Remove from oven and remove the casserole dish from the water.  Cover and cool.  Once the flan has cooled to room temperature (about 1 hour), place in the refrigerator at least 2 to 3 hours before serving. 

To serve, circle the edges of the flan with a knife.  Place dish over the top of the casserole and flip.  Jiggle until you hear the flan hit the plate. (This may take some artful jiggling.)  Scrape the bottom of the casserole dish with the knife to remove the pieces of hardened sugar.  Place these on top of the flan for decor and pour any remaining syrup over the flan.  Enjoy!  Serves 8 to 12.

This recipe was given to me by Cris Martinez.  Her husband, Tom Crapps, and I worked together.  This dark, dense, rich, delicious Cuban flan was my Christmas present from Cris and Tom the first year Tom worked with us. What a treat!!!  I love flan, so two favorite flan recipes is not extravagant. 
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