Baked Caramel Egg Custard

I've been obsessed lately with recipes utilizing the wonderful eggs my co-worker has been bringing in by the DOZENS. His hens, eight of them, are laying an egg a day. Some he claims are laying two a day. They must be very happy chickens.

Today's recipe is an old fashioned baked caramel custard. It is sublime. Eggy, creamy, sweet with a light caramel sauce on the bottom and fairly easy to make. The secret to a very creamy custard is to cook it in a bain marie, or water bath. This just means to put the cooking vessel, in my case a casserole dish, in a larger pan and surround the casserole dish with water about half way up. This is then baked at a low temperature so as not to curdle the delicate mixture.

After it is thoroughly cooled, you just scoop out the custard into individual serving dishes and then spoon the wonderful, caramel syrup over the custard. Enjoy!

Baked Caramel Egg Custard
3 whole eggs and 2 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
3 cups very hot milk
1/2 cup sugar for caramel

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. In a heavy frying pan put 1/2 cup sugar over medium high and swirl sugar around until it turns liquid. Watch very carefully and swirl often or the caramel will burn and be bitter and unusable. Pour this caramel sauce into the bottom of a 3 quart casserole dish sprayed with vegetable spray and set aside. The caramel will harden but that's okay, after baking it turns liquid again. Heat the milk in a saucepan until very hot but not boiling. In a large bowl, beat the eggs, sugar and salt together until combined. Slowly pour the hot milk into the egg mixture, whisking constantly, until combined then add vanilla. Pour the custard mixture into the prepared casserole dish. Place the dish into a larger pan, put in oven then pour hot water around the casserole to fill up to half the sides of the dish. Cook for 50 minutes until custard is totally set but still somewhat jiggly. Take out of bain marie and set aside to cool for an hour then put in refrigerator for at least 4 hours before serving.