No. 3324

Small Savarins

Petits Savarins

Butter some Savarin molds, dredge shredded almonds on the bottom and fill half full with Savarin paste (No. 148); let rise in a mild temperature until the molds are full, then place them in a brisk oven to bake; unmold as soon as removed and dip them in a syrup made as follows. Into five gills of thirty-two degree cold syrup, add one gill of kirsch, half a gill of maraschino, half a gill of noyau and half a gill of Curacoa; warm this syrup and then dip in the cakes. When they are well soaked place on a wire grate to drain.

← No. 3323 Rouen Mirlitons Small Cakes for Entremets No. 3325 Cakes Stuffed with Apricot →

For the Modern Kitchen

A yeast-raised savarin baked small and soaked in a heavily fortified syrup. Everything here depends on the dough being properly proofed and the syrup being warm rather than hot when the cakes go in.

GillsA gill is half a cup. Five gills of syrup is 2 1/2 cups; the gill of kirsch is 1/2 cup, and each half gill of maraschino, noyau and curaçao is 1/4 cup. The finished soaking liquid is roughly 2 1/2 cups syrup to 1 1/4 cups spirits, which is very strong by modern taste and can be cut back without harm.
"Thirty-two degree syrup"That is a Baume hydrometer reading, not a temperature. Thirty-two degrees is a heavy syrup, in the region of three parts sugar to two parts water by weight, boiled until dissolved and then cooled. For soaking, lighter syrups nearer 18-20 Be are often preferred so the cakes drink more and taste less cloying.
Savarin pasteRanhofer's No. 148 is a rich yeasted batter-dough, essentially the same family as baba dough, beaten to a slack, sticky consistency rather than kneaded to a smooth ball. Any current savarin or baba recipe stands in for it.
MoldsSavarin molds are shallow ring molds; individual ones run about 3 inches across. Butter them well, then press the shredded almonds into the butter so they stay put when the batter goes in. Dariole molds or a muffin tin will work, though you lose the ring shape that lets syrup reach the centre.
"Let rise until the molds are full"This is the hinge. Half-filled molds must proof until the dough reaches the rim — usually 30 to 45 minutes in a warm room. Underproofed savarins bake dense and refuse to absorb syrup; the crumb needs to be open and dry.
Brisk ovenRead that as a hot oven, roughly 400-425F. Small savarins take roughly 12 to 18 minutes, until deep gold and hollow-sounding.
Unmold and soak while hotTurn them out the moment they leave the oven, as instructed, and dip them into syrup warmed to about 120–140°F. Hot cake and warm syrup absorb; cold cake and boiling syrup gives a soggy skin over a dry middle. Give each cake a minute or two, turning once, then drain on a rack set over a tray so the run-off can be reused.
NoyauAn almond-scented liqueur historically made by steeping peach or apricot kernels. Commercial bottlings (crème de noyaux) are still sold and are what to buy; do not attempt a homemade infusion from raw stone kernels. Amaretto is a reasonable substitute.
Yield and servingA batch of savarin paste using about 2 cups of flour fills roughly ten to twelve small molds. Serve the same day, at room temperature, often with whipped cream or fruit in the ring.

A Little History

The savarin is a ring-shaped variant of the baba, and is generally traced to the Parisian pâtissiers Julien in the mid-nineteenth century, who named it for Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, author of La Physiologie du goût. The distinguishing trick of the family is that the cake is deliberately baked dry and then rebuilt with liquid — a yeasted crumb acting as a sponge for syrup and spirits. Ranhofer, who ran the kitchen at Delmonico's in New York, placed these among the entremets, the sweet dishes that came near the end of a long service, and his soaking syrup — kirsch, maraschino, noyau and curaçao all at once — reflects a period when a well-stocked restaurant still kept a shelf of flavoring liqueurs for the pastry department rather than the bar.