This well-known dessert component is often served with sugar-coated fruits or flavored with fruit brandies such as kirchwasser (cherry brandy). It was actually invented in France in a Paris café that was a regular spot for Bavarian nobility but it has since become a common component of German cuisine.
Ingredients
- 7 oz Sugar
- 6 Large Eggs, yolks only
- 1 Vanilla Bean, split (substitute 2 tsp vanilla extract, if bean is unavailable)
- 12 oz Whole Milk
- 1 Tbsp Gelatin, bloomed in 3 Tbsp water
- 8 oz Heavy Cream
- 2 tsp Sugar (vanilla sugar, if available)
How to Make It
- In a small mixing bowl, combine the sugar and egg yolks; mix to combine.
- Put the milk in a small pot, and scrape the tiny seeds and pulp out of the vanilla bean with the back of a chef ’s knife. Add both the pulp and the 2 pod halves to the milk, and heat the milk to just under simmering over a medium-low flame.
- Remove the pod pieces from the milk and temper the milk into the egg yolk/sugar mixture, mixing constantly while adding.
- Add the bloomed gelatin to the egg and milk mixture, and place the contents of the mixing bowl in a small pot. Return the pot to the medium-low flame, and, while constantly stirring, heat the mixture until it thickens.
- Once the custard thickens, remove it from the heat and allow it to cool to room temperature on an ice bath (don’t allow it to get too cool, or you will have a very difficult time folding in the whipped cream).
- Combine the heavy cream and sugar in a mixing bowl, and beat with a wire whisk or in an electric mixer with a whip attachment until stiff peaks are just achieved (do not go past the early stiff peaks, or folding will be much more difficult).
- Fold the whipped cream into the custard mix, taking care not to overmix and lose the volume attained by whipping the cream.
- Place the Bavarian cream in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours before serving.
