Fine art for sweet tooths
What an exceptionally great day. One of those perfect NYC days.
I visited the Farmers Market at Union Square and purchased a small bushel of tiny yellow-and-green-striped heirloom tomatoes. I bought a loosey and smoked it on the steps while watching the chess players. I ate very expensive and highly delicious Greek fro-yo that I willfully embellished, and weighed down, with jewel-toned berries that bled saporously into the cup's creamy blankness.
And I met an Artist. A really talented one.
An artist who depicts fruit and desserts so lusciously it almost feels foolish to describe them in words. So juicy and plump and ripe and dark red are the cherries. I can just feel the burst of scarlet juice in my mouth, threatening to dribble past my lips and inelegantly down my chin.
So exquisite is his flan. He describes it in color and shape: the rich, sticky caramel just coming loose as it settles over the jiggly circumference of the sweetest, eggiest shade of vanilla. All burnt ochres and the creamiest of yellows.
Maybe I should make flan? Invite the Breakfast Club over? I think as I move from canvas to canvas.
Flan party! I decide, as the Artist himself explains his process to a group of onlookers and potential patrons in plain, everyday language that goes down like a palate-cleansing glass of fresh, cool water against all the intricately sensual and elaborately beautiful imagery surrounding us.
I will make flan and serve it on the Delft china that I registered for at Bloomingdale's about a minute after I got engaged. China is forever, whereas, in my case, Marriage is not.
I will get bunches of fat cabbage roses and mix in tight-bulbed ranunculus that are days away from blooming, collecting them in a shiny, sharp-angled stainless steel coffee carafe.
I can live in his paintings, so familiar is the dun-colored lace doily that a just-bitten jelly donut rests on. It was an integral feature of my grandmother's entertaining and decor style. I'm imagining the sticky, candy-red mess that, in about five seconds, the half-enjoyed donut will run into.
Fine art for Sweet Tooths.
And finally, I'm standing in front of a painting depicting, referencing, honoring an image created by an Old Master of a woman's bush, up close and hairy as Mother Nature intended. Her skin as smooth and pink and temporal as the petals of the roses in the vase in front of her.
He joins me in front of this painting. Not saying anything, waiting placidly for a reaction.
"Wanna come to a Flan Party?" I turn to him, half-joking.
"Flan, not pie?" he retorts seamlessly, his eyes registering amusement behind his tortoiseshell frames.
"Bravo!" I say.
Am I complimenting his bon mot, his artistic skill, or his Artist persona? If only Van Gogh had a fraction of this guy's social skills, he probably wouldn't have had to fuck with Gauguin.
I'm still feeling the sugar rush of the art show as I sit on the steps in Union Square, smoking a loosey. Eyes on the chess players, thoughts on my flan party.
Should we play chess? I wonder. We could play chess and eat flan.
No. We should make art and eat flan, I decide instead.
Nuve-Pauvre Riche Bish Crème Caramel — Flan
Ingredients
2/3 cup plus 1/2 cup sugar, divided
6-8 oz crème fraîche
1 (14 oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
6 eggs, lightly beaten
1 - 11/4 cups half-and-half
3 teaspoons vanilla extract, or the seeds of one vanilla bean
Preparation
1. First things first: Caramelize the sugar.
Best practice is to cook 2/3 cup sugar over medium heat in an even layer in a heavy-bottomed skillet. Shake the skillet intermittently, but DO NOT stir (it will form clumps and crystals). Once it's melted, you can stir and shake until the color begins to deepen to a rich, dark golden brown, about 5 minutes.
Pour the caramelized sugar into a deep-dish Pyrex pie pan. Make sure you tilt the pan to coat the bottom with liquid gold.
2. Make the custard.
Preheat oven to 325°F.
In a large bowl, beat the crème fraîche until smoothed out and relaxed. Add the remaining sugar. Then mix in the condensed milk, eggs, half-and-half, and vanilla until smooth, frothy, and well combined.
3. Bake in a bain-marie.
Place the caramel-coated pie plate in a roasting pan. Pour the egg mixture into the pie pan, over the caramel layer. Add hot water to the roasting pan until it reaches approximately halfway up the sides of the pie plate.
Place the roasting pan on the middle rack of the oven and bake for 60–75 minutes, or until the custard is set around the edges with a slight wobble in the center.
Remove from the oven, let cool, then refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, preferably at least 4 hours.
4. The grand inversion.
With a spatula or knife, loosen the flan from the sides of the pan. Dip the bottom of the pan in hot water for approximately 20–30 seconds.
Place a large platter or tray on top of the pie plate and, et voilà, flip!
