Ingredients
Four of Hungary or fine flour, 9 ounces (or less)
Eggs, 2
Egg yolk, 1
Milk, 1/2 glass [3 ounces]
Beer Yeast, size of a small egg
Butter, 3 ounces
Marsala Wine, 1 tablespoon
A pinch of salt
Flavor of vanilla
Cognac, 1 tablespoon
Grapes of Corinth (raisins), 1 ounce
A few Malaga grapes without seeds
A few thin slices of candied fruit
For dusting
Confectionery Sugar, 1 ounce
Directions
Place the beer yeast in a handful of flour of Hungary, add a few drops of warm milk and work this into a rather solid roll. Place it near the moderate heat of the stove in a covered dish with a little milk and cut a cross on the dough so as to detect when it has raised. This should take about half an hour.
Break the eggs into a pan, add the sugar and beat well; add the rest of the flour, the beer yeast, the butter, melted and warm, the Marsala wine and cognac, and mix well. If the dough is hard, soften it with warm milk. Work it well with a wooden spoon until the dough separates from the pan by itself.
Add the raisins, the grapes and the sliced candied fruit.
Place it in a cake dish twice as large as the loaf smeared with butter and flour. If possible use a rib-shaped baking dish. Cover it air-tight and place it in a lukewarm stove, or country oven, to be raised. This will take about 2 hours. If the raising is successful, the loaf should be twice as big, that is, it should reach to the edge of the dish.
Bake the cake without exposing it to the air. Stick a toothpick into it, and if the toothpick is dry when drawn out, the cake is done, but due to its thickness it must be left in the stove a while longer to allow it to dry in the tepid heat. If Baba is baked properly, it should have the color of bread crust on the outside.
Remove it from the dish, and spray it with confectionery sugar.
Notes
This recipe (#325) was taken from "The Italian Cook Book" adapted from the Italian of Pellegrino Artusi by Olga Ragusa. It was published by S.F. Vanni in New York in 1945. For the complete copyright cook book see www.archive.org. Photo of store-bought Italian cake: Mary Melfi. |
