It’s red and blue this time, marking the end of November. I’ve also just gotten a brand new Christmas tree for the house, which is slightly taller than me (even though it’s supposed to be only 1.5 meters tall), has lots of branches and is filled with luscious green sprigs of leaves so it look a lot more authentic than the previous one. We still have a lot of memories made with the old (shorter) Christmas tree though, so the boy told me not to throw it away. Okay fine.
The tree is almost all decked up and ready for Christmas. I’m just missing a few more ribbons to fill in some gaps, that’s all. This year, I also splurged a little bit on new decorations including a set of six transparent (glass looking) tin soldiers (one of my favourite stories is the little tin soldier whose legs got shorter and shorter because his owner can’t do simple art and craft), six beige Christmas balls, a few dangling crystals of droplets and snowflakes and a huge star which belongs right at the top. It looks amazing as it is already. So when the Christmas lights (which are integrated as part of the tree now) are switched on, the effect is amazing – stargaze, starlight and star bright.
So why savarins for Christmas? It’s a French sponge cake that’s small and sweet, baked in a special savarin mould that allows the cake to have a small hole in the middle. It’s sweet because it’s soaked in sugar syrup, and the hole in the middle allows it to be filled with cheese and topped with sweet fruits and delights to serve it with. I wasn’t confident to make this cake to start with, and thought for a long time before I decided to go for it. I am glad that I did, because the cakes rose very well, and they looked as though they could create an impulse in everyone to want to eat it right there and then. And because it is very small (takes just one big bite), it is a great cake and dessert to have at dinner parties to impress and to shine. Most important of all, it looks and smells like Christmas.
Yum yum!
Ingredients:
- Bread flour: 40g + 160g
- Instant dry yeast: 6g
- Milk: 110g, warmed to 38 degrees Celsius
- Sugar: 50g
- Egg: 5, large
- Plain flour: 200g + extra for dusting
- Salt: a pinch
- Butter: 170g, melted & cooled till still warm + extra for greasing
- Water: 500g
- Sugar: 300g
- Rum: 100g (or use rum flavouring)
- Whipping cream: 200g, whisked till set into cream
- Blueberries / blackberries / strawberries: a handful, sliced
Method:
- Whisk together 40g bread flour, instant dry yeast, milk & sugar. Ferment at 27 degrees Celsius in a container for 20min.
- Beat together eggs, 160g bread flour, plain flour & salt using a paddle on medium speed for 2min.
- Add in fermented yeast mixture. Whisk another 2min.
- Add melted butter. Whisk on slow for 1min. Once mixed in, mix on high for 2-3min till dough texture starts to form. Leave to ferment in warm place for 30min.
- Grease savarin moulds with butter. Dust evenly with plain flour.
- Scoop whisked mixture into piping bag. Pipe into savarin moulds till half filled. You will need to use a scissors to snip off the dough each time you finish the piping.
- Proof 30min in a warm place.
- Bake savarins at 200 degrees Celsius for 20min till golden brown. Leave to cool.
- Boil together water and sugar till sugar is dissolved. Leave to cool.
- Stir in rum while syrup is still lukewarm.
- Dip savarins into syrup very quickly and remove. Set aside to let the syrup drip for a while.
- Pipe fresh cream into center of savarins where the holes are. Garnish with fresh berries to serve.
Trick:
- Do not leave the savarins in the syrup for too long or the savarins will become overly soaked and drenched. You will only need to coat the surface with the syrup to sweeten it – a quick dip!
Disclaimers:
- This recipe was kindly adapted from Don Yong’s Celebrity Chef’s Cookbooks: Bread Winners.
- At step 3, it already looked like the mixture was getting a bit too wet. So when I poured in the butter at step 4, it started off looking like a disaster, but slowly and surely, the dough started to form again and when piped into the mould, looks right for sure. Increasing the speed of the mixing to medium high after 1min helps to make sure the dough is kneaded well.
Serving:
About 30 small savarins
