A rum cake à la the Italians

Say wine, snacks or haute cuisine and the gourmands at online food magazine FavorFlav know where to drink, how to eat it and what to cook. This time our cheffies serve you: a delicious rum cake from Italy.

Traditional Italian recipes with a modern twist: the new cookbook Big Mamma’s Cucina Popolare is full of them. The Italian chefs of Big Mamma cook according to the traditions of their mothers but with a contemporary signature. Like this Neapolitan babà with rum: the sweet cake soaked in a boozy syrup. So ridiculously delicious!

Preparation: 30 min
Cooking: 120 min 
Servings: 8

INGREDIENTS
For the dough
140 g flour, preferably type 00
7 g fresh yeast or 1 tsp dried instant yeast
pinch of salt
1 tsp honey
45 g butter, at room temperature
3 eggs

For the syrup
1 organic orange
1 vanilla pod
250 g fine granulated sugar
1 cinnamon stick
1 star anise
1 tbsp rum

How to make babà with rum

• Start with the dough. In a large bowl, mix the flour with the yeast, salt, honey, butter, and two eggs using an electric mixer. Knead the dough by hand until you have a smooth dough (it should not stick to the sides of the bowl).
• Add the remaining egg and mix again with the mixer. The dough should now be thinner but still hold together.
• Grease the walls of a silicone babà mold with eight cavities lightly. Place the babà mold on a baking sheet. Distribute the dough evenly among the cavities of the mold. Fill each mold to a maximum of two-thirds. Let the dough rise in a warm, humid place for at least two hours, until the dough reaches the top of the cavities.
• Preheat the oven to 170 °C. Bake the babà for 20 minutes. Immediately remove the babà from the mold after baking and let them cool.
• Make the syrup. Only grate the orange part of the orange peel with a vegetable peeler or grater.
• Pour 650 ml of water into a saucepan. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla pod above the pan. Also add the vanilla pod, fine granulated sugar, cinnamon stick, star anise, and grated orange peel. Bring the water to a boil, remove it from the heat immediately, and let the syrup cool.
• Pour the cooled syrup into a large, perfectly clean (canning) jar and add the rum. Dip the babà one by one into the syrup, being careful not to break them. Seal the jar tightly. Let the jar sit in the refrigerator for at least five hours.
• Serve the babà by carefully scooping them out of the glass jar with a clean spoon and placing them on plates.
• Pour a spoonful of rum syrup over each babà.
• Feel free to adjust the amount of rum in the syrup to your taste. Neapolitans use very little or no rum, while Parisians like a lot of alcohol. Anything goes. The babà will keep for a week in the glass jar, provided it is really perfectly clean.

Image: Big Mamma’s Cucina Popolare