Recipes

Savarina (taken from Larousse's Gastronomique, 1961)

500g sifted flour, 375g butter, 25g sugar, 20g yeast, 8 whole eggs, 1 decilitre warm milk, 10g salt

Put sifted flour in a large wooden bowl, make a well in the middle, put salt and yeast in this well, having diluted yeast with warm milk.  Add eggs and work paste with the hands to mix well. 

Detach those portions of it which stick to walls of the bowl and add to the paste.  Distribute softened butter in small quantities over the paste in a warm place until it has doubled its original bulk.

Add sugar and knead the paste so that it may absorb the butter.  Put dough into buttered ring mould of the type know as a 'Savarin mould', taking care to fill it not more than three-quarters full.  Let it rise in a warm place until the dough has risen to the top of the mould.

Cook in a hot oven for 45 minutes.  Allow to cool completely before turning out.

To serve, soak the savarina in a rum syrup (or syrup flavored with some other liqueur).  When the cake is well soaked, take it out of the dish and sprinkle over a few more tablespoons of kirsch or rum just before serving.