Zabaglione - was, Re: SC - Book Review WAS Verjus

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Stefan li Rous wrote:
> 
> But what is this "Zabaglione"?

Does everybody remember Adam West as Batman when the bad guy's
girlfriend would hit on him? "You poor... deluded, child..." (Sorry,
Stefan, no disrespect intended.) Zabaglione is a classic Italian
dessert, somewhere in between a custard and a hot mousse, with maybe a
little of the character of hollandaise sauce thrown in there, too.
Flavored with white wine and often some lemon, it's sort of a beaten-up
foam of egg yolks, producing a light but thick custard, often eaten
warm. 

> Does this end up being more like a flan? Or
> a pudding?

Hmmm. Definitely not a flan, which is normally made with milk or cream
and then baked. And to call it a pudding is kind of an understatement,
sorta like calling a turbocharged 1937 Bentley a car.

> I'd like to add it the Florilegium, but I'm not sure where to
> put it where others would look. In what general category would you look
> for such an item?

Hmm, I see your problem. Maybe you need a file entitled Meringues, Sweet
Custards, and Other Egg-Based Sweets? The trouble is that zabaglione
(which I believe means something like sea foam) is a wine-based custard,
or rather the eggs are thinned down with wine rather than with milk or
cream. In a sweet dish this is fairly unusual, I'd say. Not
unprecedented, but unusual in the big picture.

What the posted recipe fails to provide is a lot of the method, which,
as Fra Niccolo mentions, involves constant beating of eggs and etc.,
usually over hot water in a double boiler, as it becomes a mass of shiny
foam and suddenly thickens. It can be served warm or cold, but hot
zabaglione kicks butt, because it combines the whole warm-custard
comfort-food thing with the aromatic and faintly dangerous hot wine
fumes. No, under normal circumstances for most people, it is not
dangerous at all, it's just, well, hard to explain. 

Adamantius, who tried anyway
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com