• Preheat oven to 350°F. Place egg yolks in a medium bowl. Add vanilla and stir to combine. Set aside.
  
• Pour cream into a medium sized heavy saucepan. Add granulated sugar and pinch of salt. Stir to combine. Continue stirring and turn the burner onto medium heat. Keep stirring until the sugar dissolves and the cream just starts to simmer. Turn heat off.
  
• Add a few tablespoons of hot cream to egg yolks as you stir vigorously. Keep adding small amounts of hot cream to the egg yolks until they are very warm. Then pour egg yolk mixture into cream mixture. Turn burner to medium heat and stir constantly for about a minute. Remove from heat.
  

Place six (4 oz.) porcelain ramekins on a pan with a raised edge. I actually used two (13x9) aluminum baking pans with 3 ramekins per pan. Pour custard into ramekins. Then CAREFULLY pour boiling water into pan (not touching the custard) so that you have about 1-inch of water surrounding the ramekins.

• Carefully place pans in oven. Bake for 35 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Cover and place in the refrigerator to chill until ready to serve. When you're ready to serve (after at least 1 hour or overnight), add brown sugar to the top of each custard dish. Turn the broiler on and let them broil for about 1 minute (about 5 inches from the heating element) or until sugar melts. Watch it closely to make sure it doesn't burn.
  
• Let cool, then garnish and serve.