Sweet Indulgence: Baked Leche Flan

If you ask any Filipino- what is your favorite native dessert? The answers might be halo-halo, maja blanca, ube... and definitely, leche flan will be part, if not on top, of the list.

I love leche flan. In fact, if I remember correctly, making leche flan was my very first attempt in cooking. I was still in high school then. I didn't have money to buy the ingredients, so I had to make do with what was in the house. Instead of evaporated milk, I used Nido Full Cream Milk. Instead of condensed milk, I used Nido Full Cream Milk with lots and lots and lots of white sugar.

I then steamed the concoction... it did form into a flan, but the taste was very far from the other yummy leche flans I'd tasted. At the end, whenever I wanted to make Nido leche flan, I would put in scoops of Ricoa cocoa powder... only then did my family say that it's good. But still, it was not the original leche flan I wanted to make.

After those several episodes, I didn't attempt to make leche flan for a long time. I don't know, maybe I was traumatized? :P Or maybe I just thought it was time to move on to other desserts.

But once in a while, I still get a craving for leche flan. And it's really expensive to buy leche flan in restaurants! A very small leche flan in Max's Restaurant (the least expensive one among those included in the Top 10 leche flan list) would cost around P50.

So I decided to give leche flan another try. But this time, I wanted it to place it in ramekins to make it more classy. So I googled if I can make leche flan via baking. And as it turned out, yes, I can! :)

Here's the recipe I adapted from http://www.testedkitchen.com/how-to-make-baked-leche-flan-milk-custard/ :

Ingredients:
1 250ml Condensed Milk
1 250ml Evaporated Milk
5 Egg Yolks
1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
Sugar for caramel sauce

Makes 4 full ramekins (It can be 6, but since I only have 4 ramekins, I had to make do with them. But they were very full)

How:
1. Preheat oven to 350°F

2. In a small saucepan, place sugar with a bit of water. 1/4 cup of water for every cup of sugar. Do NOT mix.

3. Bring to boil on high heat without stirring. Lower heat to medium and continue boiling.

4. Swirl the pan once in a while to even out the color. Turn off heat when the sugar turns the color of amber. Be careful not to burn it or it will taste bitter!

4. You now have your caramelized sugar. Pour equal amounts of caramelized sugar on the bottom of each ramekin.

5. In a bowl, beat egg yolks. Add condensed milk and evaporated milk. Stir well so that no bubbles form.

6. Slowly pour mixture into 4 - 6 ramekins. Better if you can fill ramekins up to only 3/4 of its capacity so that mixture will not spill as it cooks.

7. Place ramekins in a bigger tray or pan filled with water.

8. Bake in oven for 30 minutes or until center is firm to the touch.

9. Allow to cool.

10. Enjoy! :)

What's the difference of a baked leche flan with a steamed one? The taste is the same... but the texture of the baked leche flan is softer and more melts-in-your-moth.

When I make leche flan again, I think I'll opt to bake it.

And oh, the best part of home-made leche flan? The total cost for the ingredients for 4 - 6 ramekins is actually less than P100! Wow! :)