Christmas treat

By Tom Harte

Just about every country has a special dessert to mark the holidays, ranging from the famous English plum pudding (ironically containing no plums) to the less familiar Pan de Pascua, a cross between panettone and stollen popular in Chile.

Of all the national holiday desserts, however, none is as iconic as the classic French yule log or Bûche de No'l. It's traditionally a filled and rolled sponge cake covered with chocolate buttercream that has been scumbled (that's Julia Child's term) to look like tree bark and bedecked with edible decorations, such as meringue mushrooms.

Without the Bûche de No'l, Christmas just wouldn't be Christmas for the French. A couple of months before the holiday, literally every pastry shop in the country, no matter how small, puts out its interpretation of the cake. Some get carried away, not unlike their couturier counterparts, and conjure up out-of-this-world creations like Christophe Michalak's bûche, modeled after the cascading staircase at Paris' Hotel Plaza Athenèe. (Frankly, this strikes me as sacrilegious, like colorizing the movie "Miracle on 34th Street.")

Traditional or modern, the Bûche de No'l has its origins in the ancient Celtic tradition of celebrating the winter solstice by bringing a log of wood, often decorated, into the home to burn in the hearth, typically for days, for good luck. As large hearths disappeared to be replaced by small stoves, burning huge logs became increasingly inconvenient, so ultimately the yule-log cake symbolically took its place.

Clemence Pereur, who was born and trained in France and now owns her own French bakery in St. Louis, pours rich chocolate mousse into a log-shaped mold which will be frozen to create her modern Buche de Noel.TOM HARTE

Eager this year to participate in the tradition with a Bûche de No'l of my own, I quickly realized I had only two choices. I could buy one at Williams-Sonoma, but it would set me back $90. (For that sum it seems like I should get not just a cake log but a cake log cabin!) Or I could make one from scratch. So I opted for the latter.

First I consulted my well-worn copy of "The French Chef Cookbook," and found Julia Child's recipe which, she claims, is "quite easy to do." Still it has 40 steps and takes hours. I thought I'd better get some help, so I headed to Like Home, the charming little bakery on Lindell Boulevard in St. Louis, run by French expat Clemence Pereur who, having put in a stint at France's famed emporium Fouchon, knows her way around a Bûche de No'l.

Like the cool-pastry chefs of France nowadays, she's branched out, so to speak, to a bûche made in a mold rather than the traditional rolled version. This eliminates the most complicated part of the old-fashioned recipe and in the process boosts flavor by replacing mere sponge cake with meringue cake (dacquoise) and using lots and lots of chocolate mousse to form the log.

After visiting Pereur's kitchen, where I was the only one not speaking French, and observing her as she expertly put together this masterpiece, I think I can safely say, without going out on a limb, that her Bûche de No'l puts others in the shade.

Modern Bûche de No'l

After filling a log-shaped mold with chocolate mousse, Clemence Pereur, who worked in her native France before opening a bakery in St. Louis, places a slice of dacquoise on top to form what eventually will become the base of her modern Buche de Noel.TOM HARTE ~ photos@semissourian.com

This is Clemence Pereur's recipe for the sort of Bûche de No'l you'll find these days all over France.

Clemence Pereur of Like Home, her authentic French bakery in St. Louis, folds dry ingredients into whipped egg whites to make the batter for a dacquoise that will form the base for her modern Buche de Noel.TOM HARTE ~ photos@semissourian.com

Clemence Pereur sprays her modern Buche de Noel with edible food color mist.TOM HARTE

• 3/4 cup almond flour
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon flour
• 10 egg whites, divided
• 1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar, divided
• 1 teaspoon unflavored gelatin
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1/2 cup plus ½ tablespoon heavy cream
• 8 ounces dark chocolate

Beat 4 egg whites until firm peaks form. Gradually add 1/4 cup sugar and beat until whites are stiff and glossy. Combine almond flour, powdered sugar and flour, then fold into meringue mixture. Pipe mixture onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, dissolve gelatin in water until softened. Melt chocolate in heavy cream and add gelatin mixture. Beat remaining 6 egg whites until firm peaks form. Gradually add remaining 5 tablespoons sugar and beat until stiff and glossy. Combine chocolate mixture and meringue and pour into log-shaped silicone mold, filling to top. Cut almond cake to fit top of mold and place on top of mousse. Freeze for one to two days. Unmold, sprinkle with powdered sugar, and decorate with chocolate shards.