Cannele could be next food fad

Ever since the HBO series "Sex and the City" set off the cupcake craze, each year has seen rampant speculation about what would be the next food fad.

This year is no exception with culinary prognosticators nominating gourmet marshmallows, Parisian macaroons and even whoopee pies as "the next cupcake." Some of these are clearly outmoded (macaroons were identified in this space two years ago as the successor to the cupcake) and others obviously self-serving (the principal proselytizer for the whoopee pie is the state of Maine, where they were invented).

I'm hoping the James Beard Foundation has it right because their prediction for the next big food trend is the cannele (pronounced kah-neh-lay). If you've ever had a cannele, you'll understand why it deserves to be all the rage. But odds are you probably haven't.

In this country canneles are rather obscure. For that matter, though a Gallic invention, they were not well known throughout France until fairly recently. They didn't even appear in Larousse Gastronomique until later revisions. Perhaps this is all because, unlike madeleines, they do not have the equivalent of a Proust to promote them. It surely can't be because they aren't ethereally delicious.

Unlike the typically flamboyant French pastry, a cannele is a little unadorned cake baked in a striated cylindrical mold that, with its many grooves, looks vaguely like a tiny Bundt pan. (The name comes from the French word for groove or channel.) Made from a crepelike batter and baked for a long time, at least an hour or two, it develops a dark, mahogany-colored caramelized crust. But though its exterior is on the crunchy side, its interior is soft and on the custardy side. The result is something like a portable creme brulee and, indeed, at least one wag has suggested that a perfect cannele is what a creme brulee aspires to be when it grows up.

Row after row of elegant canneles stand poised to give cupcakes a run for their money. (TOM HARTE)

It's not certain who invented the cannele, but it was probably around 300 years ago and certainly in Bordeaux, where it is the official cake of the city. (You can even get them at McDonald's there). One story says the treat was created before the French Revolution by nuns using egg yolks donated by local vintners after they had used the whites to clarify their wines. Another suggests that citizens living near the shipyards appropriated flour spilled on the loading docks and used it to make the cakes for poor children. Whatever the case, canneles were all but forgotten until the late 20th century when a guild was formed to protect their authenticity.

A truly authentic cannele is baked in a copper mold lined with beeswax. If you find the prospect of locating beeswax daunting, wait until you see how much a set of the copper molds costs -- around $200. Happily, there are cheaper silicone molds available today that will do almost as good a job. In fact, even if you just bake canneles in an ordinary muffin tin, they're a darn sight better than a cupcake!

Canneles

My favorite recipe for canneles is this one adapted from the celebrated pastry chef Gale Gand. I find it more efficient than others in that it calls for whole eggs rather than yolks and takes less time to bake.

3 1/4 cups milk

A cake stand filled with canneles, a unique French pastry invented in Bordeaux and possibly the next American food sensation. (TOM HARTE)

1 tablespoon vanilla

4 tablespoons butter, melted

3 eggs

2 tablespoons dark rum

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons sugar

A cannele, a French specialty from Bordeaux, drizzled with caramel and garnished with whipped cream. (TOM HARTE)

1 1/2 cups flour

Combine milk and vanilla. Whisk in the eggs, then the rum and butter. Add flour and sugar and whisk to combine. Refrigerate overnight. If using copper or metal molds, thickly coat with butter and chill until butter is firm. If using silicone molds, there is no need to grease, but you can coat them with canola oil and chill to promote browning. Whisk batter to reincorporate. Fill molds to almost full and bake at 400 degrees for about an hour until dark and caramelized on the outside. Cool 10 minutes and remove from molds. Makes 16.

Tom Harte's book, "Stirring Words," is available at local bookstores. A Harte Appetite airs Fridays 8:49 a.m. on KRCU, 90.9 FM. Contact Tom at semissourian.com or at the Southeast Missourian, P.O. Box 699, Cape Girardeau, MO, 63702-0699.