Bavarois aux Framboises

Inspired by the book Julie and Julia, and encouraged by the recent movie of the same name, I made my first foray into French cooking. I found Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle and Simone Beck at the library and began perusing for recipes. I decided to begin with Bavarois aux Framboises (Raspberry Bavarian Cream).

I chose Raspberry Bavarian Cream because a.) it is a dessert, my favorite type of food and b.) it is one of the recipes they actually show Julie making in the movie. I began by reading the foreword to the cookbook which begins with the now famous line, "for the servantless American cook who can be unconcerned on occasion with budgets, waistlines, time schedules, children's meals, the parent-chauffeur-den mother syndrome, or anything else which might interfere with the enjoyment of producing something wonderful to eat." In other words, these recipes are extremely fattening and will take you all day to put together so don't have anything else planned.

The entire foreword is a hilarious admonition to return to the tried and tested techniques of the French in order to produce the most delicious food ever prepared by man. Les 3 Gourmandes write,

Each of the several steps in the process, though simple to accomplish, plays a critical role, and if any is eliminated or combined with another the texture and taste of the [dish] suffer. One of the main reasons that pseudo-French cooking, with which we are all too familiar, falls far below good French cooking is just this matter of elimination of steps, combinations o f processes, or skimping on ingredients such as butter, cream--and time. 'Too much trouble', 'Too expensive' or 'Who will know the difference' are death knells for good food.

Taking Julia's message to heart I followed the directions to the letter. I even read the entire recipe from start to finish before ever picking up the first spoon, as she suggests. And I didn't conserve the dishes either. After all, as Julia says, "A pot saver is a self-hampering cook."I used almost every dish in my cupboards. The only thing that I "cheated" on was using an electric mixer to beat my egg whites and whipping cream. Julia believes that beating with a bubble whisk gives a much more desirable effect. Well.....too bad. The use of my arm for the rest of the day is somewhat critical to me so I got my egg whites to stiff peaks the 'artificial' way. Sue me.

While I didn't find the actual execution of the dish to be exceedingly difficult, just making sense of the recipe takes a little work. You see the cookbook is divided into sections like any normal cookbook, but then it is also divided into 'master' recipes and 'variations'. So in order to make a Raspberry Bavarian Cream I had to first start with the Master Recipe for Bavarian Cream, which in turn begins with the Master Recipe for Creme Anglaise which is accomplished through techniques explained in detail in the "Fundamental Techniques and Information section at the beginning of the chapter. All of this results in a lot of page turning and cross referencing and general confusion. You can see why it is important to read the entire recipe before beginning.

So without further ado I give you Bavarois aux Framboises (with the intro written by Julia and her compadres, but without all of the crazy cross references).

Bavarian cream is a mold of creme anglaise (custard sauce) with gelatin, beaten egg whites, lightly beaten cream, and a flavoring. It is unmolded after it has been chilled, and makes a dessert as beautiful to see as it is to eat. When properly made, it has a most lovely, light , creamy, velvety quality and ranks as one of the best of the molded desserts.

We were curious to try out some recipes for Bavarian cream which claimed to produce masterpieces in seconds, so we experimented with the electric blender, raw egg yolks, cracked ice, and so forth. We also ran various changes of our own, such as substituting frozen fruits of ice cream for cracked ice. Though the molded results looked handsome, their flavor and consistency were disappointing. We have concluded that this particular masterpiece cannot be achieved in seconds; a cooked
custard, well-dissolved gelatin, stiffly beaten egg whites, properly whipped cream, perfect flavoring, and then the right blending of one element into another at the right time seems to be the requisites for a true Bavarian cream. The classical method below is certainly far from difficult, and the whole dessert may be prepared the day, or even two day, before serving.

1.) Gradually beat 1 cup granulated sugar into 5 egg yolks and continue beating for 2 to 3 minutes until the mixture is pale yellow and forms the ribbon. Beat in 2 tsp. cornstarch.
2.) Meanwhile dissolve 1 1/2 Tbsp. gelatin in 1/2 cup of raspberry juice.
3.) Puree 1 pint of fresh raspberries or 1 lb. of frozen berries. Push through a sieve to remove seeds. Set aside 1 cup of puree. I didn't have a sieve small enough to keep out the seeds so my bavarian cream had a little texture. I thought it was still delicious.
4.)Boil 1 1/2 cups milk. Beat the milk in a thin stream of droplets into the egg yolk mixture. Pour into a sauce pan and set over moderate heat. Stir with a wooden spoon until mixture thickens enough to coat the spoon lightly (170 degrees). I used a candy thermometer just to be sure I got it to the right temperature.
5.) Remove from heat and immediately add the gelatin mixture, beating for a moment or two until gelatin has dissolved completely. Rinse out the mixing bowl and pour in the custard.
6.) Beat 5 egg whites and a pinch of salt until soft peaks are formed; sprinkle on 1 T. of sugar and beat until stiff peaks are formed.
7.) Fold the egg whites into the hot custard. Set in refrigerator to cool. Fold gently with spatula several times while mixture is cooling, to keep it from separating.
8.) Beat 1/2 cup chilled whipping cream until doubled in volume and beater leaves faint trace on the surface.
9.) When custard mixture is cold and almost but not quite set, fold in whipped cream and raspberry puree. 10.) Turn in to molds. I don't have a large Jell-O mold so I used individual molds. Cover with lightly oiled wax paper and chill for 3 to 4 hours or overnight. 11.) To remove from mold dip outside of mold in hot water for a few seconds then reverse onto a chilled platter. The Bavarian Creams are best served very cold.

The Raspberry Bavarian Creams got rave reviews from everyone that tasted them. They were extremely light and airy with a slight raspberry flavor. The only thing I was disappointed in was the color. Because the custard is a pale yellow color when I added the bright red raspberry puree it did not make a pretty pink dessert. Instead it made a blush colored cream. One guest I served it to said, "I eat it just like this, with no crackers or anything?" He thought it was a ham salad of some kind. I do have to admit that it was kind of a hammy color. Next time I will add some food coloring to make it look a little more appealing.

Otherwise I wouldn't change a thing about my Raspberry Bavarian Creams. We tried them cold, lukewarm, fresh, a week old and on top of brownies and no matter how we ate them they were delicious. If you're are looking for an easy intro into French cooking then this might just be the recipe for you.

Come back next week for Souffle a la Vanille.

For more great recipes check out Tempt My Tummy Tuesday and Tuesdays at the Table.