Milk Chocolate Pots de Crème Recipe

Pots de crème translates to “jars of cream.” This recipe is a classic, especially for Paris Dining Club. Unlike many pots de crème recipes, this one doesn’t call for baking the custard in a water bath. Instead, we make a thick custard to pour over the chocolate and whisk it together.

There’s a few crucial steps:

1. Use good quality chocolate. We use a blend of Valrhona Caramelia milk chocolate (36% caca0) and Valrhona Manjari (64% cacao). The combination of the two helps balance out the sweetness of the milk chocolate. If you’re buying a brick of chocolate, be sure to cut it into smaller pieces so it melts when you pour the custard over top.

2. Getting the custard to the right consistency without it over-cooking can be difficult. If you overcook the custard, your pots de crème will be grainy and once cool, will almost look like chilled cookie dough batter. If you under-cook the custard, the pots de crème won’t set up as the eggs didn’t cook enough. The important thing is to have your mise en place ready to go so your custard doesn’t sit too long in the pot as it will continue to cook even if it’s off the heat. And as ever, the more familiar you practice making custards, the more you know what to look for when it’s ready. (But don’t be discouraged. Even some professional cooks struggle with this.)

Milk Chocolate Pots de Crème

serves 16

shopping list —

• 575 grams Caramelia milk chocolate

• 175 grams Manjari

• 440 grams heavy cream

• 430 grams milk

• 50 grams sugar

• 10 grams salt

• 1 ea vanilla bean, halved (hot dog style) and scraped

• 10 ea egg yolks

• 3 ea tonka bean (if desired)

equipment —

• heavy bottomed pot

• whisk

• 2 mixing bowls

• chinois or fine-meshed strainer

• ladle

• rubber spatula

• soup spoon

• gram scale

steps —

1. Set yourself up: Add the caramelia and manjari to a large mixing bowl and place the chinois with the ladle over top. Add the egg yolks to another mixing bowl and whisk until smooth.

2. In a heavy bottomed pot, add the cream, milk, sugar, salt, vanilla bean, and tonka bean and place over medium heat. Scald the cream, making sure it doesn’t boil over or burn. Whisk to ensure the sugar dissolves.

3. Once the cream is hot, temper the egg yolks by pouring 1/3 of the liquid into the egg yolks and whisk until smooth.

   *If you were to just add the yolks into the pot of hot cream, they would cook immediately and you would end up with a curdled custard.

4. Add the egg yolk mixture back into the pot with the rest of the cream. Whisk constantly over medium low heat until it becomes a thick sauce. Check this by dipping a soup spoon into the custard. Swipe your finger over the back of the spoon through the custard. If the custard runs back into the clean line you just made, it needs more time. If nothing drips back into the line, you’re good (term known as nappe). You want it to be thick, like a crème anglaise.

5. Immediately pour the custard through the chinois into the chocolate. If you have any curdled custard at the bottom of the pot, don’t scrape the rest of the custard out. Use the ladle to push the custard through the chinois.

6. Cover the chocolate with plastic wrap (without stirring) and allow to sit for 10 minutes. Uncover the bowl, and whisk until smooth, making sure all the chocolate has incorporated into the custard base.

7. Pour into pots de crème jars, espresso cups, or any cute vessel you may have. Chill in the fridge until set.
   
   

If you have any leftover base, you can keep it in the refrigerator covered — place plastic wrap directly over the base so it doesn’t form a skin. To fill your cups again, reheat the pots de crème in a double boiler over medium low heat until it rewarms, whisking and scraping the sides with a rubber spatula as it reheats.

For December, we’re serving pots de crème in a hollowed out orange. The best variety to choose are ones that peel easier so the pith is easy to remove. To do this: slice off the very top of the orange so you have a nice opening — reserving the top, if desired. Using a grapefruit spoon, gently scoop out the orange segments, being gentle so you don’t puncture the peel. Once all the flesh is removed*, try to scrape out any excess pith. Fill the oranges until almost full, and chill in the refrigerator until set. You can clean the top of the orange by scraping out any excess flesh, and place the top back on to serve. We like to poke a small eucalyptus leaf into the top of the orange to make it look like the orange just came off the tree!

*save all the flesh and hello! fresh juice!