No. 3308

Genoeses with Cream Meringued

Genoises a la Creme Meringuees

Butter and flour some tartlet molds, fill them with Genoese preparation (No. 3307) and cook in a slack oven; unmold as soon as done and when cold hollow out the centers. Fill the cakes with a St. Honore cream preparation (No. 49) flavored with orange; color it lightly with a little green; cover this with meringue (No. 140) laid on in beads pushed through a pocket; spread fine sugar over this and place in the oven to color the meringue.

← No. 3307 Genoese Cake—Light Small Cakes for Entremets No. 3309 Gooseberry Cakes and Tarts →

For the Modern Kitchen

A three-part assembly rather than a single recipe: baked genoise shells, an orange-scented St. Honoré cream, and a meringue finish browned at the last moment. Ranhofer assumes you have the cross-referenced preparations to hand, so the timing depends entirely on having the cream made and chilled before the cakes are hollowed.

A slack ovenRoughly 300-325F. Genoise baked in small tartlet molds wants a gentle heat so the crumb sets without doming or crusting; 12-18 minutes for shallow molds. They must be unmolded hot, as instructed, or the steam trapped underneath will make the bottoms soggy.
Tartlet moldsPlain or fluted tinned steel molds about 2 to 2 1/2 inches across. Modern mini-muffin or barquette tins work; butter them and dust with flour, knocking out the excess, since genoise has little fat of its own and grips the metal.
St. Honoré creamSt. Honore cream -- Ranhofer's No. 49 is generally identified with what is now called creme Chiboust: hot pastry cream lightened with beaten egg whites, in some versions an Italian meringue. Whether the whites are cooked depends on the method used in No. 49, which is not reproduced here. It deflates quickly, so fill the cakes the day you make it.
Flavored with orangeMost likely orange-flower water, an orange-zest infusion in the milk, or an orange liqueur rather than juice. Juice thins the cream and can curdle it; infuse the zest in the hot milk and strain.
Color it lightly with a little greenPeriod confectioners tinted creams with spinach green — blanched spinach leaves pounded and pressed for their juice, which is flavorless in small quantity. A drop of modern food color does the same job.
Beads pushed through a pocketA pastry bag with a small plain tip, piped as touching domes over the whole top. The meringue must go on cold cakes and cold cream, or it will slip.
Fine sugar and coloring the meringueFine sugar is caster sugar; dusting it on draws moisture to the surface so it glazes rather than dries. Ranhofer here specifies the oven, though a salamander was also available to him. A very hot oven at 450F for two or three minutes, or a blowtorch, gives the same tips of brown without warming the cream through.
Hollowing the centersWait until the cakes are fully cold. Cut a cone from the top with a small knife or press in with a melon baller, leaving a shell about a quarter inch thick; warm genoise tears.
YieldNo yield is given; it depends on the quantity of Genoese preparation made under No. 3307. They are best eaten the day they are finished, as the meringue weeps overnight.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) is Charles Ranhofer's record of thirty-odd years as chef of Delmonico's in New York, and this entremets section is essentially a catalogue of the French pastry repertoire as it was practiced for American dining rooms. Genoise — the whole-egg sponge whipped warm over a bain-marie — is generally traced to Genoa by way of its name, though it had long been standard Parisian pastry by Ranhofer's day and served mainly as a sturdy base for soaking, filling and glazing. The St. Honoré cream, better known now as crème Chiboust, is traditionally attributed to the Parisian pâtissier Chiboust and takes its other name from the gâteau St. Honoré built around it. What dates the recipe most clearly is the instruction to tint the orange cream green, a reminder of how far color and flavor could part company in nineteenth-century pastry.