Recipe: Bavarian cream

Halfway between pastry cream and crème anglaise, here is the Bavarian cream.

This cream comes directly from… France! (Or maybe Russia… Pastry history is vague, but one thing it’s certain: it doesn’t come from German Bavaria.) 🙂

French chef Carême is usually credited for inventing this cream, probably for a Bavarian client.

A Bavarian cream is nothing more than a custard sauce with gelatin and whipped cream. It is often used as a cake filling but I think it is also very good as a standalone dessert, especially when served with red fruits.

It is traditionally flavoured with vanilla, but, like for pastry cream and custard sauces, you can add any flavouring you want (e.g. chocolate, spirits, spices…).

Here are a couple of delicate steps in this recipe:

Cooking the custard: the custard temperature should reach but not be higher than 85°C; a higher temperature will make the egg yolks curdle and a lower temperature will not pasteurize the custard
Gelatin: it must soaked in cold water around 10 minutes before using, then squeezed and incorporate in the hot custard
Whipped cream: it must very cold to be whipped and it must be incorporated when the custard reaches 25°C or else it will become liquid again; it is also very important to whip cream to soft peaks: overwhipping it would give an unpleasant texture to the finished Bavarian cream.

Since this cream contains gelatin, it must be used immediately as cake filling or poured into serving moulds or glasses.

Bavarian cream

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Ingredients

100ml	Milk
100	Heavy cream (to be heated with the milk)
40g	Granulated sugar
1/2	Vanilla bean, split
2	Egg yolks
5g	Sheet gelatin (~2.5 sheets)
200	Heavy cream (to be whipped to soft peaks)

Directions

Soften the gelatin in cold water

Combine the milk, cream, 20 grams of sugar and the vanilla bean with its seeds in a saucepan on medium heat

In the meantime, whisk together the egg yolks and the remaining sugar together

Strain the boiling milk and cream onto the yolk mixture in three times to temper it. Whisk constantly.

Put the yolk mixture back into the saucepan. Stir constantly with a rubber spatula until the custard reaches 85°C (or until the custard is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon). Do not allow the mixture to go above 85°C or it will curdle.

Add the softened gelatin to the hot custard and whisk

Strain the custard into a clean bowl and place on an ice bath to chill quickly, stirring every once in a while

Whip the cold heavy cream to soft peaks (Important: the cream must not be overwhipped!)

Fold one third of the whipped cream into the custard when it is starting to set, at about 25°C or slightly cooler. A warmer temperature will make the whipped cream liquid.