I recently joined a Crème Brûlée and Financiers cooking class with a French chef . Nadege offers a variety of French dishes to cook online, but the crème brûlée and financiers intrigued me the most.

I had never made crème brûlée before because I always thought that it would be too difficult, but Nadege put me at ease straight away and gave clear instructions throughout. I was most excited to use the blowtorch to caramelise the sugar on the top, and hopefully not burn my kitchen down…

Nadege has lived in South Africa since 2001, so she shared stories with me about her life there. As this was a French cooking class, I did not expect to learn about the South African culture as well; this was definitely an added bonus to the class. 

Nadege has been offering French and South African cooking classes for the last 10 years in person, however due to lockdown she has been offering them online via AirBnB. 

Although crème brûlée is originally a French dish, she said that it is extremely popular in South Africa. She said that you can find crème brûlée on the menu in every Cape Town restaurant, and that it is one of the top 4 desserts along with a brownie.

We began making the crème brûlée mixture before putting it in ramekins inside a deep dish filled with hot water, and then in the oven. By placing the ramekins in hot water, it prevents the mixture from burning around the edges and allows them to cook all the way through. These were placed in the oven for 30 minutes. 

This recipe included 7 eggs and Nadege taught me a fantastic tip about eggs. If you place them in a cup of water and they float, they are not fresh, however if they sink to the bottom the eggs are fresh and good to use. 

We did this trick with all the eggs before using them. I have always been someone to place my eggs in the fridge. However, Nadege told me that eggs can stay fresh on the side for up to 3 weeks, even in Cape Town heat!

While waiting for the crème brûlée to cook in the oven we moved on to baking the financiers; these were quick and simple to make. They made the perfect biscuit / cake texture to dip into the crème brûlée. I am so glad that I joined this online French cooking class, as this is something I would have probably never cooked in the kitchen alone.  

Thanks for reading!

Although this class did cost £31, the ingredients themselves only came to £5. Some may say that this is overpriced for an online cooking lesson, but I now know how to make the perfect crème brûlée and I had a great lockdown evening with Nadege!