No. 362

Bavaroise

An infusion of tea sweetened with gum syrup and orange flower-water with milk. Have half as much boiling milk as tea; sweeten it with gum syrup, and flavor with orange flower-water; the latter can be replaced by a small glassful of good brandy. Bavaroise is taken at night before retiring.

← No. 361 Indian Arrowroot Broths & Soups for Invalids No. 363 Chicken Broth Plain →

For the Modern Kitchen

A hot tea-and-milk nightcap from the invalid section of Ranhofer's book. The proportions are given as ratios rather than measures, so the only real decisions are the strength of the tea and how heavy a hand you use with the orange flower water.

The ratioTwo parts strong tea infusion to one part boiling milk. For a single serving, about 2/3 cup of tea to 1/3 cup of milk fills a large cup.
Gum syrupA sugar syrup thickened with a little gum arabic, standard behind nineteenth-century bars for the body it gave to cold drinks. Plain simple syrup (equal weights sugar and water, boiled briefly) does the same sweetening job here; start with 2 teaspoons per cup and adjust.
Orange flower waterSold as orange blossom water in Middle Eastern groceries (not to be confused with neroli, the concentrated essential oil). It is potent and turns soapy fast: 1/4 teaspoon per cup is plenty, and it should be stirred in off the heat so the aroma is not driven off.
The brandy versionA "small glassful" in this period is not a fixed measure; it probably indicates something on the order of a cordial or small wine glass, so perhaps 1 to 2 fl oz. Either way that is a substantial dose in one cup, and the recipe has it replace the orange flower water rather than join it.
Tea strengthMake the infusion stronger than you would drink it plain, since a third of the finished cup is milk. Black tea steeped 4 to 5 minutes suits it; the drink is meant to be sweet and perfumed rather than bracing.
Heating the milkBring the milk just to the boil and use it at once. Milk held at a simmer skins over and takes on a cooked flavor that fights the orange flower.
YieldAs written the recipe is a formula, not a batch. Scale by the cup; it does not keep and should be drunk hot.

A Little History

Bavaroise entered French café culture in the early eighteenth century and is generally traced to the Café Procope in Paris, where it is said to have been made for visiting Bavarian nobility, hence the name. The early versions were tea sweetened with sirop de capillaire (a maidenhair-fern syrup) and cut with milk; by Ranhofer's day the syrup had become plain gum syrup and the flavoring orange flower water or brandy. Its place here, among the broths and gruels for invalids in The Epicurean (1894), reflects the period's faith in warm, sweet, mildly aromatic drinks as sedatives, a faith that kept them in nursery remedies and put a glass of hot spirits at the bedside. Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's for over thirty years, included a section for invalids as a matter of course: a household that dined at his level expected its kitchen to feed the ailing as well as the assembled.