Creamy Japanese Flan really surprised me when I ate them the first time!!
I first tasted this sensational pudding back in 2000 at a Japanese Italian restaurant called “Pastel”. This famous pudding was not like ordinary pudding, it featured a new texture called “nameraka purin”. Nameraka purin (creamy Japanese flan) is very smooth, and like crème brûlée, but the burnt caramel is on the bottom of the pudding rather than on the top.
Old Western Influence
Japanese people have been in love with custard-based sweets since the Portuguese introduced castella sponge cake in the 16th century. Purin, the Japanese word for pudding is a popular western-influenced dessert in Japan and can be found in any grocery stores or convenience stores in Tokyo. And of course, there’s purin emoji too. 🍮
Creamy Japanese flan is a great dessert for any age
This creamy custard pudding is a great dessert for dinner or tea time and only requires a few simple ingredients. It also is a great snack for kids and can be made 3 days ahead! You can decorate them with berries or whipped cream right before you serve them.
Collect used jars for this recipe
Although I love shopping for anything related to cooking and baking. I encounter the same dilemma every time I go shopping for new cooking tools. I ask myself, How often am I going to use this mold? Should I really spend this much money on this cooking tool that I will use once a year? The great part about this recipe is that you don’t need to spend any money on extra equipment. Leftover yogurt jars are a perfect solution for this recipe. I collected 10 jars over the course of one month and although I realize I am hoarding, this is better for the environment and the wallet.
Ingredients
- ½ cup (100g) of sugar
- 1 ½ tablespoon (22g) of water
- 2 tablespoons (30g) of hot water
- 4 pc (65g) of egg yolk
- ⅓ cup (67g) of sugar
- 1 cup (237g) of milk
- 1 cup (237g) of heavy cream ½ vanilla beans
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300℉/150℃ degrees. Prepare glass jars or ramekins.
- In a small deep saucepan, cook sugar and water over medium-low heat until melted. Stir them a couple of times or shake a pan to cook evenly. Once it turns into dark brown, like caramel color, remove it from the heat. Be careful to overcook, because caramel keeps cooking by residual heat after you turned the heat off.
- Immediately, and really carefully, pour hot water, and stir them. Pour the caramel in each individual jars or ramekins at approximately 2 tablespoons. Tilting them so the caramel swirls around on the inside.
- In a medium saucepan, pour milk, heavy cream. Slice the vanilla beans and open lengthwise, scrape the tiny seeds out, put the seeds, and beans into the milk. Heat them to approximately 140℉/ 60℃ temperature.
- While heating up the milk, add yolk and sugar into a big bowl, beat them lightly.
- Pour the warm milk into the egg mixture gradually.
- Run the egg mixture through a strainer. And take out the vanilla beans.
- Scoop out some bubbles from the surface of the egg mixture.
- Pour the egg mixture into the prepared jars or ramekins.
- Place the individual jars in a large tall baking pan, carefully pour hot water around the custard jars to a depth of about 1.5 inches (4cm).
- Cover the pan with foil, cook them for 20 to 25 minutes until the center part of the pudding becomes solid. Jiggle the puddings slightly to see if they are done. Wobbly but not liquidy.
- Remove from the oven, and carefully take the jars out from the baking dish and let cool on a wire rack for 30 minutes, then transfer to the refrigerator. Chill for a minimum of 2 hours or overnight.
Notes
- Although I use real vanilla beans for this recipe, you can use vanilla extract as a substitute.
