SweetloreEncyclopedia of World Sweets (534）
Gâteau creusois
Gâteau creusois
Gâteau Creusois: Ingredients and Preparation
Cakes ／ Creuse department, France
Gâteau creusois is a baked hazelnut cake from the Creuse department in central France. Made with fragrant toasted nuts and butter, it is baked into a moist cake. Locally, it is also simply called “le Creusois.”
Hazelnuts and Egg Whites
In a home recipe, toasted and crushed hazelnuts are combined with sugar, flour, whipped egg whites and melted butter. The roasted hazelnuts are at the heart of the aroma. Whipping the egg whites incorporates air into the batter, and the melted butter adds richness. This formula is one example presented for home baking.
Even among pastry chefs who belong to the local artisans’ association, each has their own way of baking the cake and handling the hazelnuts. One shop in Aubusson roasts the nuts thoroughly and leaves small pieces in them to give the cake some bite. That pastry chef’s particular touch is to form a thin baked crust on the surface that contrasts with the soft interior.
A Department Specialty Chosen by Pastry Chefs
According to one story, a recipe written on 15th-century parchment was discovered in an old monastery near Crocq. It is also said that the cake was baked in curved roof tiles. French pastry researcher Yukiko Omori has written about reserving and buying one baked in a tile while in the region. She notes that it was normally sold in a round shape. The Nouvelle-Aquitaine regional products guide describes the parchment story as a legend and explains that in the late 1960s a pastry chef, inspired by this story, revived the Creusois. Since neither the discovered original text nor the baking methods of the time can be verified, it cannot be said for certain that today’s cake and the 15th-century cake had the same recipe.
The commune of Crocq explains that André Lacombe, president of the department’s pastry chefs’ union, wanted to create a departmental specialty that every shop could make and that would keep well, and chose a hazelnut cake by Robert Langlade, a pastry chef in the town. As a cake made by pastry chefs in their own shops, it became known beyond the department as well.
The commune’s public newsletter also records an event honoring these two men, at which there were cake tastings and cake-making for children. Today’s “le Creusois” is made by local pastry chefs, and apart from the recipes published for home baking, there is a recipe handed down within the artisans’ association.
Glossary
- André Lacombe
- President of the pastry chefs’ union of the Creuse department, who conceived the idea of a departmental specialty cake.
- Robert Langlade
- A pastry chef in Crocq who made the hazelnut cake chosen as the department’s specialty.
- Le Creusois
- The name of the hazelnut cake of the Creuse department, also used for the cakes made by local pastry chefs.
_-_whole_with_kernels.jpg){kind=link}