Rum Baba
Introduced to European dessert lovers in the 1830s, Rum Baba is a delightful warm cake soaked in rum and filled with cream. The Italian twist is serving it topped with mascarpone. Think of this as a drunken bundtlette or brioche!
Ingredients
Rum Syrup
- 450 ml water
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 vanilla bean pod
- 1 lemon zest
- ½ cup rum
Vanilla Mascarpone
- 2 egg yolks
- ⅔ cup Icing Sugar
- 1 vanilla bean pod
- 350 g mascarpone cheese
Cake
- 200 g plain flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 ½ tsp dried yeast
- 3 tsp sugar
- 4 eggs
- 50 g butter
Instructions
For the rum syrup
- Boil the water and sugar together with the scraped vanilla bean seeds and lemon zest. Allow to cool before adding the rum and set aside. Refrigerate.
For the mascarpone
- Cream together the egg yolks, icing sugar and scraped vanilla bean seeds. Add in a large dollop of the mascarpone and mix well. Fold in the remainder of the mascarpone and refrigerate.
For the cake
- Preheat your oven to 190 °C.
- In a small saucepan, or in the microwave, melt the butter and allow to cool.
- In a mixing bowl with a dough hook attachment, combine the flour, salt, yeast, sugar and eggs. Add the melted butter and mix together well. Cover the bowl and leave to prove until the dough is double in volume (about 45–60 minutes).
- Grease your desired six mold cake tray with butter and fill each cup two thirds full. Again, leave to prove until the dough fills the top of each mold (about 15 minutes).
- Bake for 6–8 minutes until golden.
- After baking, carefully remove from the tray and immerse each cake into the cold rum syrup.
- Serve immediately with the mascarpone dolloped on top.
Notes
- Scraping a vanilla bean is simple: slice the pod in half and open with your fingers. Using the back of a knife, press down firmly and scrape all the seeds from inside the pod. Transfer the vanilla bean seeds to your recipe ingredients. An authentic Italian look and feel to your desserts.
- As an at-the-table added flair, place a cake on each dessert plate. Cut each in half with a cake knife and pour over the rum syrup from a retro jug or bottle and top with a healthy dollop of mascarpone.
-This recipe is from Gusto at The Grand in Auckland. Gusto's Rum Baba 1835.
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