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Thor Cooks!

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Crème Brulee

Crème Brulee

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CARBON DATING

Crème Brulee
Ingredients:  Eggs, sugar, vanilla extract, heavy cream, hot water, fire

Leave it to the French to create such an amazing and complex dessert out of a handful of ingredients.  You really just create a custard and refrigerate it then pour a layer of sugar on top and hit it with a torch to caramelize the sugar creating a warm glassy layer on top of a cool custard, so when you slice into it with a spoon you get these two different tastes and temperatures. 

When I say you caramelize the sugar on the top of the Crème Brulee, you light it on fire with a torch and melt and brown it.  By caramelizing the sugar, you are carbonizing it as well, transforming it from an organic compound into carbon, this process happens over 400 degrees Fahrenheit.  When carbonizing the sugar you have started a process where the isotope Carbon 14 you have just created starts a slow degradation into the isotope Nitrogen 14. You now have allowed for the process of carbon dating to be possible, where the C14 takes 5,730 years to degrade by half into N14, which can be accurately dated.  

I really don’t have much of a sweet tooth, but I absolutely love this, and it’s surprisingly easy to make, the only thing is you need special bowls called ramekins and a torch at the ready.  
 

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