The recipe looks laborious but it is really easy to make. You need to prepare a caramel first and then the flan.
These quantities are enough for 6 small flans. We use small (metal) pudding basins but you can do this in normal ramekins and you can make a big flan (in a big pudding basin or in a pyrex bowl).
For the caramel you need:
- 75 g sugar
- 6 teaspoons of water
And for the flan:
- half a litre of full fat milk
- 3 eggs and 2 egg yolks
- half a table spoon of vanilla essence
- 175 gr sugar
Preheat the oven at 150 degrees.
For the caramel, put the sugar and water in a pan over medium heat. Let it bubble without touching it (do not stir) until it gets to a dark golden colour ( it takes 3-4- minutes only but you have to watch it carefully as it is easy to burn it). Pour the caramel over the flan ramekins so that it covers their base.
For the flan, heat the milk until it is about to boil. Separately in a bowl mix the eggs, yolks and sugar and beat well. Add the hot milk while you keep stirring and finally add the vanilla essence. Pour the mixture into the caramelised pudding basins.
Put the basins on a deep oven tray and into the preheated oven. Pour carefully boiling water into the tray (up to one third of the hight of the ramekins) so that you get a 'bain marie'.
The small flans are ready in 30 minutes ( if you do a big flan with all the mixture you will need 50 minutes)
Let them cool down for at least 2 hours and get them out of the basins by going around the edges of the basins with a snap knife first. They keep for 2-3- days in the fridge (the easiest is to keep them inside the basins).
