Do try this at home: A holiday dessert à la FIU student-chefs


What would our Panther Holiday Cooking Special be without a delicious dessert? Not a complete meal – and certainly no fun at all. FIU alumnus and student-chef Rodney Barchi ’04 puts the finishing touch on our holiday menu with his award-winning recipe for spiced pumpkin crème brulée and ladyfinger cookies.

FIU student-chefs Rodney Barchi '04, Laura Mañon and Christian Poole, and the delicious meal they prepared for our Panther Holiday Cooking Special.

The holidays are upon us.

They are days away…days that will be spent shopping, traveling and cooking. So, as you know, we thought, why not bring a little bit of FIU into our kitchens by way of FIU student-chefs recipes hat would reflect their international flavor of the university and offer alternatives to traditional dishes.

By now, you have seen senior hospitality management students Christian Poole and Laura Mañon prep and share their recipes for an acorn squash soufflé and a yucca and butternut squash with pecan and cippolini onion topping mash, respectively.

Earlier this week, Poole was back on kitchen duty, showing you how to make his Asian cranberry glazed roasted duck and now, his fellow School of Hospitality and Tourism Management student Rodney Barchi ’04 – a future pasty superstar if we ever met one.

The 28-year-old Ecuadorian is, in fact, sharing his award-winning take on crème brulée, so you can rest assured it will make you very popular this season if you should decide to try your hand at it.

One more thing before you go: Happy Holidays! And make it a delicious one.

Spiced Pumpkin Crème Brulée with Ladyfinger Cookies

For the ladyfinger cookies:

3 large eggs, separated
½ cup of sugar, plus 2 tablespoons
½ tablespoon of vanilla extract
½ a cup of all purpose flour
3 tablespoons of powder or confectionary sugar

Mix the yolks with ½ a cup of sugar in high speed for 2 minutes. Add the vanilla and keep mixing for 1 minute.

Mix the whites with the 2 tablespoons of sugar until forming stiff peaks (when you pull the whisk or the beater a straight peak of meringue should hold without bending).

Gently fold the yolk and white mixtures together with a spatula. The mixtures do not have to be completely incorporated.

Sift the flour on top of the egg mixture and fold again to incorporate the flour.

Finally, pipe the cookies with a pastry back in straight lines, dust powder sugar on top of the piped cookies and bake for around 6 minutes or until golden at 325 degrees.

After the cookies turn golden, leave the oven door open (not completely) at the lowest possible temperature and the cookies inside for about 10 minutes so the cookies dry out and get crispy.

A spiced pumpkin crème brulée and ladyfinger cookies by Rodney Barchi '04.

For the pumpkin brulée:

2 cups of heavy cream
1 cup of whole milk
½ of cup sugar
2 tablespoons of pumpkin spice
Zest from one orange
1 cup of pumpkin puree
12 large eggs yolks

On a saucepan heat up the heavy cream, milk, pumpkin spice, sugar and orange zest. Take the pan off the heat once the first bubbles appear. Discard the orange zest and cool the cream mixture, preferably on an ice bath.

Mix the yolks and the cool cream mixture, strain it and add the puree and mix.

Fill ramekins with the custard almost to the top. Bake in a water bath for about 40 minutes at 275 degrees or until the custard is set (it should not look liquid-y).

Completely cool down the ramekins overnight if possible. Five minutes before serving, sprinkle sugar on the top and with a torch caramelized the top, in circles, from the outside in. If a torch is not available, use the broil setting in the oven. Put in ramekins and make sure the ramekins are 4-6 inches away from the roof of the oven.

Garnish with the cookies, serve and enjoy.