Babà

Babà

Duration: 1 h + 3h di lievitazione

Difficulty: Challenging 

Origin: Campania

Babà is a typical Neapolitan pastry dessert. This dessert was born from the revisitation of a Polish dessert, which exploited above all the leavening procedure which guarantees an extremely frothy and soft consistency. This dessert, called babka ponczowa, became simply babà, a much more pronounceable term. Soaked in rum, today this dessert has managed to conquer not only the hearts of Neapolitans, but of all of Italy, becoming a sweet symbol of the city. This dessert is prepared either in a single version, with the classic mushroom-shaped babà, or in the shape of a cake which is sliced and served in a similar way to a panettone. It is enjoyed alone, but is often also garnished with custard, whipped cream and fresh fruit.

Ingredients

For the dough:

• 250 g of 00 flour
• 3 eggs
• 175 g of sugar
• 85 g of Butter
• Milk to taste
• 15 g of brewer’s yeast

For the bath:

• Rum
• 1 lemon
• 1 kg of water
• 400 g of sugar

How to Proceed

To prepare the babas it is advisable to work the dough with a planetary mixer and the recipe photos will refer to this preparation. If you want to work the dough by hand, the preparation of the recipe is practically the same. Use a bowl instead of the stand of the mixer.

Pour all the flour into the base of the mixer and make a well. Take the brewer’s yeast and dissolve it in a cup of warm milk. Then pour the liquid into the well you will make at the top of the flour fountain.

Add a pinch of salt. Begin kneading in the center with your hands, using only the flour close to the liquid, until a sticky dough has formed in the center (the yeast). Cover it with a little flour from the fountain and leave it in the middle of the fountain to rise. Then take the base, cover it with a cloth and leave it to rise in a warm, sheltered place for about 15 minutes. Just enough time to start the leavening.

In the meantime, take the eggs and break them into another bowl. The eggs should be at room temperature. Then make a splash.

Once the time has passed, take the base of the planetary mixer and remove the cloth. To knead, attach the hook to the mixer and then insert the base into the mixer with the flour fountain and the yeast in the centre. Add the equivalent of an egg and start kneading. When this is well incorporated into the mixture, add the equivalent of an egg, and so on until all the beaten mixture has been used up.

Then once all the eggs have been absorbed into the mixture, add a spoonful of milk and after another 5 minutes, add a second spoonful of milk. Continue kneading until you have a nice homogeneous dough.

Once you have obtained a nice homogeneous mixture, stop the mixer and remove the base. Cover it with a cloth and let it rise for at least an hour. Once the time has passed, check the leavening. The dough should have doubled in volume, if not, wait again. In the meantime, take a bowl, put the sugar and the butter softened at room temperature.

Mix the butter and sugar well until you obtain a smooth white cream.

Once the leavening time has passed, you should have a nice foamy dough in the bowl full of air and with approximately double the starting volume. Lightly pierce the dough with your fingertips and then add the white cream of sugar and butter. Put the base back into the mixer and start kneading again.

When all the mixture has been well mixed, also absorbing the sugar and butter, stop the mixer and remove the base. Take the babà molds and butter them first on the inside and then flour them. Then with wet hands and the help of a spoon, fill the molds with the dough. Fill them all to about 1/3 of the volume.

Take all the molds and place them in a warm, sheltered place to let them rise. Check the state of the leavening, because it could vary depending on the molds you use. After about 1 hour – 1 hour and a half the volume of the dough should have reached the top of the mold.

At this point, heat the oven to 160°C and let the babas cook for about 40 minutes. During cooking you will see the dough grow even more in volume, forming the characteristic mushroom shape. Once cooked, turn off and let cool very slowly. When the babas have cooled, remove them from the molds (and not before, otherwise they will break).

Now it’s time to prepare the syrup in which we will immerse the baba to moisten them. Take a pan, add 1 liter of water, sugar, lemon zest and bring it to the boil. The sugar will dissolve completely and the lemon zest will pass its aromas to the syrup. Turn off and let cool.

When the syrup is lukewarm, add a nice glass of rum, and then mix. Now take the babas and pour them one after the other into the syrup, making them moisten well. When the babas are well soaked, remove them from the bath and let them rest slightly.

Now you can serve the freshly made babas, but it would be better to let them rest for at least a day. The following day, before serving them, sprinkle them again with the syrup. The babas should always be moist and soft.

You can also fill the babas with cream and fruit in syrup.