No. 3095

Cabinet Pudding a la Royale

Pouding Cabinet a la Royale

Butter a square, hinged mold and fill it three-quarters full with Savarin paste (No. 148); leave it to rise in a mild temperature and when it reaches to a quarter of an inch from the top close the cover and bake in a slack oven. As soon as it is done unmold and leave set till the following day. Butter and sugar a cylindrical timbale mold. Cut up the stale Savarin cake in quarter-inch thick slices and cover one side with apricot marmalade (No. 3675); cut some of these into inch-wide bands the same height as the mold and fasten them on their uncovered side all around the inside of the mold, having them standing upright and overlapping each other; cut the remainder of the slices into dice and use them to fill up the mold in alternate layers with candied fruits also cut dice-shaped and macaroons. Put in a vessel twelve egg-yolks, two whole eggs, six ounces of sugar and two ounces of orange sugar; beat the whole together and dilute with a pint of milk and a pint of cream; pass it through a wire sieve. Pour this preparation slowly into the mold until well filled, then leave it to soak for several minutes; lay the mold in a saucepan with water reaching to half its height and cook it in a slack oven for an hour and a quarter; take it from the oven and let stand for a few moments, then unmold it on a dish and cover over with apricot marmalade. Serve with a sauce-boat of Sabayon with Marsala sauce (No. 3096).

← No. 3094 Mellow Pudding, Apricot Sauce Hot Entremets — Puddings, Fritters & Soufflés No. 3096 Cabinet Pudding with Sabayon →

For the Modern Kitchen

This is a two-day construction: a yeast-risen savarin baked and staled on day one, then lined into a mold and set with a rich custard on day two. The hinge is the water bath and the low oven — the custard carries twelve yolks plus two whole eggs to a quart of dairy, and any real heat will curdle it into a grainy, weeping mass.

"Slack oven"A cool oven, conventionally reckoned somewhere around 250-300F, both for the savarin and for the pudding; nothing here wants color beyond pale gold.
Savarin pasteNo. 148 is Ranhofer's yeast-raised savarin batter, a soft dough of the baba family, slack enough to be spooned rather than kneaded. Any plain baba or savarin dough works, and the recipe itself directs that the cake be left till the following day before slicing.
Orange sugarSugar rubbed hard against the zest of oranges until it is damp and fragrant, then dried and sieved. Two ounces is a little over a quarter cup; the zest of two or three oranges creamed into the sugar gives the same effect.
Custard proportionsA pint of milk and a pint of cream means a full quart of dairy, US measure. With fourteen eggs' worth of yolk in it, this sets firm enough to unmold — do not lighten it or the pudding will not stand.
Cylindrical timbale moldA deep straight-sided mold, or a 2-quart souffle dish. Butter it, then dust with sugar rather than flour, as the recipe directs.
The soakThe several minutes of resting before baking are not optional. Dry cake pulls custard out of the interstices, and a mold filled and baked immediately will show hollow gaps and a sunken top.
Water bathWater to half the height of the mold, as written. An hour and a quarter in a cool oven suits a mold of about this size; test by inserting a knife an inch from the center, which should come out clean while the very middle still trembles.
UnmoldingThe recipe allows only a few moments; a short rest lets it firm enough to turn out without slumping.
YieldThe recipe gives no yield; a mold of this size would serve roughly ten to twelve. The sabayon with Marsala (No. 3096) is the intended accompaniment, and the coating is the apricot marmalade of No. 3675.

A Little History

Cabinet pudding — pouding de cabinet, sometimes called chancellor's or diplomat pudding — is a mid-nineteenth-century restaurant staple built on the same logic as an English bread-and-butter pudding: stale cake, dried and candied fruit, and a set custard, turned out of a mold. The a la Royale version in Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) shows what a Delmonico's kitchen did with that idea when labor was cheap and a brigade was on hand: the humble stale cake is replaced by a savarin baked expressly to be staled, the interior is patterned with upright bands and diced fruit, and the whole thing arrives glazed and sauced. The savarin itself is generally traced to the Parisian pastry house of Julien in the 1840s, an adaptation of the older baba, and is often said to have been named for the gastronomic writer Brillat-Savarin. Ranhofer's cross-references — to paste No. 148, marmalade No. 3675, sauce No. 3096 — are the tell that this book was written for professionals working from a system, not for a household cook working from a single page.