Although my family probably ate baked custard for dessert, I mostly remember it as an afterschool snack, scooped from a well-worn casserole dish and served without ceremony. It seemed like the homemade, comforting equivalent of vanilla pudding.

It wasn’t until I started experimenting with custard-based desserts at home, like flan and crème brûlée, that I realized the creations that can fetch high prices at an upscale restaurant are really just stylish versions of old-fashioned baked custard. As I explain this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon, once you become comfortable with making custard, fancier desserts are just a topping away. The main transition from old-fashioned baked custard to the more exotic sounding desserts is a caramel sauce, made by simply heating sugar until it melts and becomes golden, or a crunchy caramelized sugar shell, best achieved with a kitchen torch.

Learn more about the base for custard variations and get the complete recipe for Golden Baked Custard in my column.

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Caramel Custard Variations

Variations on baked custard that have earned their own name typically pair the smooth, creamy custard with caramelized sugar, either saucy or crunchy. The custard itself tends to stick to the same base ingredients, although when I looked at a selection of recipes I’ve tested, the ratios can vary—less on the name of the custard and more with personal preference, depending on whether the recipe creator wanted a creamier custard, a richer egg-forward one, or light pudding-like spoonfuls.

The old-fashioned baked custard recipe that my grandmother made as my afternoon snack tends to be fairly light, with one of the highest ratios of milk to egg. You might want to increase the egg in the custard if you want to remove it from its mold before serving it as flan and crème caramel. Using a blend of whole eggs and yolks will turn the custard a brighter yellow with a strong egg flavor; blending heavy cream and whole milk will make it far richer.

These are just a few of the more well-known variations of baked custard:

• Crème caramel or flan: Whether called by its French or Spanish name, this dessert is essentially the same caramel custard. Before you make the custard, melt 1/2 cup of sugar into a smoky, sticky syrup using the first step of the technique I use for Fresh Caramel Sauce. When you remove the caramel from the heat, instead of whisking in cream, pour it into your custard cups, tilting them to coat the bottom. Then continue to mix and cook Golden Baked Custard in the coated dishes. Thoroughly chill the custard before loosening it with a knife, flipping it onto a plate, and serving.
• Crème brûlée: This starts with the fully baked and chilled custard recipe but then gets a sprinkling of granulated sugar on each dish that is melted with the heat from a butane blowtorch. As when you make caramel in a pan on the stovetop, the sugar will melt and then caramelize. You need to watch the sugar carefully to avoid scorching and burning it, so I recommend using a kitchen torch, like this one I tested for The Spruce Eats, rather than an oven broiler. You can use the same technique to put a crunchy topping on crema Catalana, a citrus-infused custard cooked entirely on the stovetop.
• Pudding: If you grew up with vanilla pudding from a box, even Grandma Tiny’s baked custard might seem too eggy. Try replacing the whole egg with 2 egg whites and a little of the milk with cream. You might prefer to boost the sugar too.

Twice as Tasty

When you’re making this week’s recipe and variations on it, a few of these tips and tricks may come in handy:

• Ultrafine sugar and flaky salt dissolve more quickly into the egg than standard grinds. If I’ve scraped the seeds from a vanilla bean for buttercream frosting or flavored whipped cream, I bury the remaining vanilla pod in sugar. Once it’s sat a couple of weeks, I use the infused sugar in this and other recipes.
• The hardest part about making custard is tempering the egg by pouring the hot milk slowly enough to keep the proteins from curdling. If you’re concerned about slopping in too much at a time, return the scalded milk to the cup you used for measuring so that you can pour more steadily.
• I’ve never needed to strain my custard, but many recipes recommend pushing it through a fine-mesh sieve, arguing it produces a silkier texture. If you struggle when tempering the egg and end up with lumps, strain it before you pour the custard into its baking dish or cups.

You can find other showy yet easy dessert recipes in the recipe index. Read more of my work off the blog here.

Want more Twice as Tasty recipes? Get my books! Click here to order a personally signed, packaged, and shipped copy of The Complete Guide to Pickling directly from me. I also share tasty ways to use pickles in The Pickled Picnic; it’s only available here.