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Dessert

Petits Savarins, with Apricot Sauce

Petits Savarins are small French cakes filled with a light baba paste, topped with apricot syrup, maraschino, and brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Petits Savarins, with Apricot Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Make a paste with flour, eggs, and butter, similar to Baba.

  2. Chop the almonds coarsely.

  3. Butter twenty dariole moulds.

  4. Sprinkle the chopped almonds over the buttered moulds.

Bake

  1. Allow the baba paste to rise for about 30 minutes until light.

  2. Fill the dariole moulds three-quarters full.

  3. Let the filled moulds rise until slightly above the rim.

  4. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until light in color.

  5. Use a folded paper underneath to prevent darkening.

  6. Trim the bottoms of each Savarin to make them level.

Soak and serve

  1. Place the Savarins on a large dish.

  2. Pour over the syrup mixed with maraschino and brandy about one hour before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the structure of the baba paste that holds the risen savarins.
Eggs
Provide structure and lift to the batter, helping it set as it bakes.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the paste and crumb.
Blanched almonds
Add crunch and nutty flavor to the crust of each savarin.
Syrup
Adds moisture and sweetness that soak into the baked savarins.
Maraschino
Adds aromatic, fruity sweetness to the soaking syrup.

The step that matters

Allow the paste to rise before baking. The yeast-leavened paste needs time to rise until light and slightly above the rim. Underproved paste bakes dense, while the rise sets the open, airy crumb that absorbs the syrup well.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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