Zabaione - Zabaglione

The Zabaione (or zabaglione) in its beautiful simplicity

Zabaione, also called zabaglione or “eggnog”, is an egg-based dessert, made also with sugar and liqueur. It’s an excellent and pleasant tonic served in cups. Some people like accompanying it with whipped cream and dry biscuits, or use it as an accompaniment to different sweets, as it matches them very well. The best one is, for example, the twisted millefoglie to the custard.

Its origin is uncertain. A version traces it back to 1500, when captain Emiliano Giovanni Baglioni reached the doors of the city of Reggio Emilia and he camped there. As he was short of provisions, he sent some soldiers to raid the farmers of the zone, but they only found eggs, sugar, some flasks of wine and some aromatic herbs. Lacking other ingredients, he made them mix up and that preparation turned into the ancestor of “zabaione”. The is was given to the soldiers, who were pretty enthusiastic about it. Then it was usually called Giovanni Baglione or 'Zvàn Bajòun' and the cream took the name after it becoming 'zambajoun', then zabajone, and finally zabaione.

Another version points out the zabaione as a Piedmontese typical dessert. According to the tradition it was brought to Turin from Fra' Pasquale de' Baylon and it became a success immediately after: a quick recipe able to reinvigorate any numbness. Fra' Pasquale, from the church of St. Thomas, was bieng accommodated and he recommended it to the penitents that complained to him of their husbands being "not vivacious.". The original recipe ingredients were an egg yolk, two teaspoons of sugar, two abundant half spoons of marsala and a half spoon of water. The mixture had to be put on the fire to “bagnomaria”, and be mixed up until the first signals of boiling.

The recipe quickly became popular in Turinese cuisine and when Fra' Pasquale was canonized (in the year 1680), the dessert was named after him - St. Bajon. The “Sanbajon”, became the italian word Zabaglione or Zabaione, and it traveled so much that it became popular all over the world.

Zabaione with amaretti biscuits

Thanks to this extraordinary invention, St. Pasquale de Baylon was chosen to be a part of the small team of protectors of Cooks, from 1722.

In Turin, he is revered in the Church of St. Thomas in Pietro Micca street, and his portrait is placed in the choir of the church of the Mountain of the Cappuccinis. His tribute is celebrated on May 17.

St. Bajlon also has some followers in the South Italy, especially among those girls looking for husband. In Naples, people have dedicated a church and the “plaza” to him. In that church, there’s a headstone reading: "Built by king Carlo III to thank you for having gotten masculine offspring."

Of course, there’s also a third version of the history, a Venetian one, which traces the zabaione up to a dense drink coming from the Venetian coasts of the former Yugoslavia, called "zabaja."

Zabaione Recipe

Zabaione is traditionally prepared by mixing egg yolks with sugar and a spirituous wine, for example Marsala, Madeira, Sherry, Port or whatever wine you may have at hand. You can also use dry wines like Barbera or Nebbiolo. The traditional recipe states the use of a unity of measure for wine that is the half of that used for the eggs in the recipe.

Ingredients for 4 People:

4 egg yolks

80 grams of sugar

4 half eggshells of spirituous wine, like Marsala or Sherry

Zabaglione with a savoiardo biscuit and strawberries

Preparation:

Put the yolks in a bowl, add the sugar and whip the mixture for a long time until it gets soft. Add four half eggshells of spirituous wine or other dessert wine to the eggs. Keep on mixing very gently. Put water in double-boiler with the mixture of the “zabaione” and cook it to “bagnomaria”. Keep mixing it with the whisk. Pay a great deal of attention while cooking, almost all the time, so that heat under the pot is not too strong. In that case, the mixture would stick to the pot bottom. In that case, take the pan containing the mix away from the water for an instant, or lift it above the flame, so that the heat is softer. Cook the zabaione untill it is well swollen and pour it into a terrine or into a bowl and allow to cool. You must never leave the zabaione in the cooking pan for two reasons: First, because if you have used a non stagnated copper pan that is not healthy, as some copper particles may spoil the preparation. Secondly, whatever type of pan you may have used, it is still very hot and the zabaione would keep on cooking.