No. 3006

Brioches St. Mark

Brioches St. Marc

Butter twelve small timbale molds (No. 1, Fig. 137), fill them three-quarters high with brioche paste (No. 130), and leave to rise in a mild temperature, and when the molds are partly full bake them in a slow oven. After taking them out cut them off level with the tops of the molds and leave in till cold, then empty them partially and pour over the insides some syrup flavored with maraschino and almond milk (No. 4), filling them up with frangipane cream (No. 43). Cover the outsides with apricot marmalade (No. 3675) and strew the sides with green pistachios and white almonds, both chopped up finely. Ornament the tops of each brioche with a rosette composed of halved pistachios and a split cherry laid in the center. Dress them in a circle on a dish, and arrange in the center some stewed halved peaches. Cover the ornamentation on the brioches with maraschino syrup thickened with a little apricot marmalade, and dress in the intersection of the peaches some freshly shelled white split almonds, and also some candied halved cherries, then serve. Have a sauce-boat of English vanilla cream sauce (No. 3004) to accompany this entremets.

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For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer writes in cross-references, so this is really an assembly job: brioche, almond-milk syrup, frangipane, apricot glaze and a custard sauce all come from elsewhere in the book. Read it as a plan for twelve individual baba-style pastries rather than a single set of instructions.

What the numbers meanNo. 130 is brioche paste, No. 4 almond milk, No. 43 frangipane cream, No. 3675 apricot marmalade, No. 3004 English vanilla cream sauce. Substitute a standard rich brioche dough, pastry cream enriched with ground almonds, sieved apricot jam let down with water, and crème anglaise.
Timbale moldsThe recipe specifies the No. 1 mold of Fig. 137, a small metal timbale; no size is given. Dariole molds, popover tins or squat ramekins of similar small capacity all work; butter them heavily, as enriched dough sticks.
The slow oven"Slow" is usually read today as somewhere around 300-325F, though the book gives no figure. That is low for brioche; bake until set and only lightly colored, since the crumb has to be hollowed and then soaked with syrup. Timing will depend on the size of mold you use.
Fill three-quarters, not fullThe dough is proofed in the mold and, per Ranhofer, baked once the molds are "partly full". The baked tops are then cut off level with the mold rims so the insides can be hollowed, soaked and filled.
Almond milk here is not the carton kindRanhofer's No. 4 is blanched sweet almonds pounded with water and sugar and strained — closer to orgeat than to modern shelf-stable almond beverage, which is far too thin and lightly flavored to carry this syrup.
Apricot marmalade means glazeNineteenth-century apricot marmalade is a thick sieved apricot preserve, brushed on hot so it sets tacky. It is the adhesive for the chopped pistachios and almonds as much as a flavoring.
Yield and serviceTwelve pastries. They are dressed in a ring around stewed peach halves with the vanilla sauce passed separately; Ranhofer files it among hot entremets, though the brioches are filled cold.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) records the kitchen of Delmonico's in New York, and this is a characteristic Delmonico dessert: not one preparation but several, cross-referenced by number and assembled into a centerpiece. The base is the syrup-soaked brioche family that runs from the baba and savarin through dozens of nineteenth-century variations, each distinguished chiefly by its garnish and its liqueur — here maraschino, the clear cherry spirit of the Dalmatian coast that was widely used in fashionable French and American pastry work of the period. The name may be a nod to Venice and its basilica, in keeping with the era's habit of attaching place-names and patrons' names to otherwise standard formulas, but this is guesswork: Ranhofer offers no explanation, and the book is full of such titles.