Babka. Cheese babka. As a cupcake base.
August 19, 2020 3:32 PM Subscribe
I have a cheese babka. I have to make cupcakes. I want to rip up the cheese babka and make it into cupcakes, similar to making a French toast bake with challah bread. While I know I'm not getting light, fluffy cupcakes, what kind of batter do I use to bind the shredded babka? Just egg and sugar won't work right, maybe a cup of cake flour, eggs, baking powder and sugar?
I do some baking but I am not chef level. If I cream sugar and butter, and add in eggs, then flour and baking powder, would that work? Fold in the babka, maybe some cocoa powder for chocolate? I don't want it to be eggy and flat like a French toast bake, but I know this won't be angel food cake.
I do some baking but I am not chef level. If I cream sugar and butter, and add in eggs, then flour and baking powder, would that work? Fold in the babka, maybe some cocoa powder for chocolate? I don't want it to be eggy and flat like a French toast bake, but I know this won't be angel food cake.
Response by poster: I think those are the words and ideas that I am missing!
posted by kellyblah at 4:45 PM on August 19, 2020
posted by kellyblah at 4:45 PM on August 19, 2020
No suggestions, but I'd love a follow up to see what you did and how it turned out!
posted by cyndigo at 4:52 PM on August 19, 2020
posted by cyndigo at 4:52 PM on August 19, 2020
Seconding the bread pudding direction! That’s what I would do.
posted by firei at 5:14 PM on August 19, 2020
posted by firei at 5:14 PM on August 19, 2020
Nth-ing bread pudding with an optional "pro-tip": Bread pudding is basically some sort of bread product baked into an eggy custard. Babka can vary quite a bit, but tends to be denser than your average bread. Any time I want a lighter, airier baked custard - such as a pumpkin pie or challah/croissant bread pudding - I use ice cream as the custard base, and add eggs as necessary to get the consistency I want.
Ice cream is soft because it has millions of tiny air bubbles stirred into it. Whisk up half as many eggs as the recipe you're using normally calls for. Add the eggs to a large (preferably metal) mixing bowl with as much ice cream as needed to replace the rest of the ingredients in the custard. Allow the ice cream to slowly warm up, and fold in the eggs as soon as it is possible. Combine this with your babka (or other bread) and bake.
This will preserve most of the air in the ice cream, which will expand and escape from the custard when baked - creating a light mousse texture that the baked eggs will support.
posted by Anoplura at 7:05 PM on August 19, 2020 [8 favorites]
Ice cream is soft because it has millions of tiny air bubbles stirred into it. Whisk up half as many eggs as the recipe you're using normally calls for. Add the eggs to a large (preferably metal) mixing bowl with as much ice cream as needed to replace the rest of the ingredients in the custard. Allow the ice cream to slowly warm up, and fold in the eggs as soon as it is possible. Combine this with your babka (or other bread) and bake.
This will preserve most of the air in the ice cream, which will expand and escape from the custard when baked - creating a light mousse texture that the baked eggs will support.
posted by Anoplura at 7:05 PM on August 19, 2020 [8 favorites]
Response by poster: Shredded the babka, then dusted that with dutch processed cocoa powder, and 1/4 tsp of baking powder. Beat the hell out of three eggs, and 1/4 cup sugar. then folded that into the shredded babka and added a splash of light cream. Baked for about 25m at ~375. Seems like they should work. Verdict to be posted after cupcake consumption!
posted by kellyblah at 11:35 AM on August 20, 2020
posted by kellyblah at 11:35 AM on August 20, 2020
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This would create some kind of mini bread pudding situation which I would top with orange zest and powdered sugar and/or a a fruit compote/sauce.
The recipe you are suggesting sounds like a cake batter almost. I am not sure how the ripped up babka would react to that tbh!
posted by eggs at 4:19 PM on August 19, 2020 [6 favorites]