Caramelised Salted White Chocolate Bavarois
with blood orange and rosemary crumb
Hello,
As previously mentioned, I’ve been indulging my perfectionist tendencies and reworking some of my shared recipes. In other words, giving them a bit of a level up. It’s been an interesting process so far - sort of like marking your own homework a year on, with a touch of added know-how and perspective.
My recipe this week is based on my white chocolate and grapefruit bavarois. If I’m honest, I still think this is a great dessert and a good flavour pairing for this time of year, as grapefruits are coming into season as we speak. However, I was keen to make the most of blood oranges while they last, and I really felt this dish needed just a bit of extra oomph.
As a technique, bavarois is a great recipe to have under your belt because it’s pretty versatile. Essentially, it is a base of crème anglaise with added gelatine, which we then lighten with whipped cream to create a sort of mousse-like dessert. Along the way, we can choose to flavour them how we see fit. I had a lot of fun perusing my Larousse Gastronomique, which is full of retro ideas for bavarois - from simple round moulds of vanilla bavarois to towering little structures of striped desserts (which I absolutely want to explore further) with additions like pineapple and rum, or chocolate and coffee. It can then be demoulded and served as is, or piped to finish a tart or cake, or even used as a filling.
Although I started out thinking blood oranges would be the focus of the dessert, it felt wrong to try and process the oranges in any way. Physically, they are so beautiful to look at, and I thought the raspberry flavour would just be lost in anything like a caramel. So, I landed on serving them as is, simply segmented as a complementary flavour.
In contrast, I did think the white chocolate bavarois needed work to bring some excitement. I’ve caramelised the chocolate which, as expected, brings lovely caramel notes to what I consider otherwise to be the pretty one-dimensional, sweet flavour of white chocolate. A generous pinch of salt brings balance too. Having said all this, if you had some interesting white chocolate to play with I’d suggest not caramelising it. I had some amazing white chocolate from Table over Christmas, and have been thinking this dessert would be a great way to showcase it.
Finally, I’ve made a salty einkorn and thyme crumb to bring an element of crunch. I think any well-considered dessert should have a combination of textures as well as flavours, simply to make it more fun to eat. Rosemary is a classic pairing for orange, and again helps balance a bit of the sweetness from the white chocolate. The einkorn flour is a heritage grain, and I love incorporating these into sweet things to bring a little more complexity of flavour. If you can’t get hold of einkorn specifically, there’s no reason you couldn’t use another type of heritage grain, and plain flour would work just fine too.
Caramelised Salted White Chocolate Bavarois, with Rosemary Crumb & Blood Orange
This makes 6 servings. I’ve set these in rings, but you could just as easily pipe directly onto plates if you don’t have rings.
Caramelised salted white chocolate bavarois
200g white chocolate
1 sheet gelatine (I used Dr Oetker platinum grade)
2 blood oranges
150g whole milk
20g caster sugar
50g egg yolks
Generous pinch of salt
180g whipping cream (or 170g double cream with 10g semi-skimmed milk)
Preheat the oven to 120°C fan. Chop up your chocolate and place it on a small baking tray.
Put in the oven to melt (about 5-10 minutes) then give it a stir. Continue heating the chocolate in 5 minute intervals, until the milk solids have browned and you have a caramelised melted chocolate a few shades darker than when first melted - in total, this will take about 40 minutes.
Scrape into a bowl and set to one side.
If using rings, lay these onto a lined baking tray and line the insides with acetate or strips of baking paper.
Soak the sheet of gelatine in ice cold water for 5 minutes.
Zest the blood oranges into the milk, then heat on medium until steaming.
Meanwhile, whisk together the sugar and egg yolks until well combined and slightly paler in colour.
Tip a third of the steaming milk into the egg mix and whisk, then repeat with another third of the milk.
Tip the egg mix back into the pan and heat over a low-medium heat, stirring continuously (ensure you get right into the corners of the pan where it is hottest to avoid any overcooked custard!).
The mix will begin to thicken gradually - if you have a probe, you are aiming for a temperature of 82°C. If not, you are looking for the custard to be thickened and coating the back of a spoon. If it’s ready, you should be able to draw a line down the coated spoon.
Add the gelatine to the crème anglaise and stir until dissolved.
Pass through a sieve, then pour over the caramelised white chocolate. Stir from the centre until you have a homogenous mix.
Leave to cool to around 30°C - if you don’t have a thermometer, just dip a clean finger in. The mix should feel room temperature.
In a separate bowl, lightly whisk the cream to just under soft peaks.
Fold the white chocolate mix into the whipped cream.
Pour the mix evenly between the rings - about 80g in each, then pop the tray in the freezer for one hour to set. Once frozen, these discs will keep for about a month.
If not using the rings, pour the mix into a piping bag and chill in the fridge for an hour, until only just firmed up, before using.
I prefer to err on the side of caution and pipe when softer - the longer it chills for, the firmer it will be and less smooth the piped portion will look.
Rosemary crumb
60g einkorn flour (or a heritage flour of your choice)
45g light brown sugar
1 tsp flaky salt
60g unsalted butter, cold and cubed
2 sprigs of rosemary, leaves removed from woody stem (the leaves should weight about 4g)
Finely grated zest of 1 blood orange
Preheat the oven to 160°C fan.
Put all the dries in a bowl and mix together. Add in the butter and rub together with your fingertips to create a crumble mix.
Finely chop the rosemary leaves and add along with the blood orange zest into the mix.
Spread on a small baking tray and bake for 10 minutes.
Remove from the oven and use a fork to mash up the crumb, then return to the oven and bake for a further 10 minutes, until golden and crisp.
Leave to cool completely.
Assembly
Remove the bavarois from the freezer and pop out of the rings onto plates. Allow them to come to temperature for 30 minutes.
If piping, pipe 80g portions onto each plate.
Using the 3 zested oranges, slice off the tops and bottoms, then slice off the peel. Segment the oranges by running your knife along one side of the membrane, then repeating on the other side to release each segment.
Top each bavarois with a sprinkle of crumb, fresh blood orange segments, and a couple of fresh rosemary leaves.
Annabelle x