RECIPE - Cupuaçu Flan (Pudim de Cupuaçu)

The creamy, rich flesh of the cupuaçu (click here to read more) makes it particularly suited to milk-based sweets and dessert. Things like custards, creams, mousses and flans. In fact, when dealing with this fruit from the rainforest of the Amazon, if you remember its close botanical relationship with chocolate, you can easily imagine what kinds of desserts welcome the complex flavor of cupuaçu. If it's good made with chocolate, it's likely to be good made with cupuaçu.

Here's a recipe for a flan flavored with cupuaçu. Flans are as common and as prized in Brazil as they are anywhere else in Latin America. A culinary gift from the Iberian peninsula, the flan traveled with European colonizers to Mexico, to Peru, to Chile and Argentina, and to Brazil. This one is easy to make and delicious. The only difficult part might be finding cupuaçu pulp, but do check the freezer of your local health food store. With the increasing popularity of cupuaçu in the Northern Hemisphere if it's not there now, it's likely to be so soon.
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RECIPE - Cupuaçu Flan (Pudim de Cupuaçu)
Serves 8

1 cup granulated sugar
1 can sweetened condensed milk

3/4 cup (200 ml) water
4 whole free-range eggs
1 Tbsp. cornstarch

1 cup frozen cupuaçu pulp
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Preheat the oven to 350F (175C).

Caramelize the sugar, then line a glass or ceramic cooking dish with the sugar. (For a photo tutorial on how to safely caramelize sugar, click here.)

Add the remaining ingredients to a blender, then blend until smooth and creamy. Pour the liquid into the caramelized baking dish, then put the dish into a large glass casserole or lasagne dish. Pour in boiling water until water reaches the top of blender liquid. Carefully place on middle rack in pre-heated oven. Cook for approximately 45 minutes, or until the top is golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Remove from heat. Let cool completely.

To serve, briefly set the baking dish is hot water to melt the caramel, then reverse the dish onto a serving platter. Serve immediately.