Zabaione — warm Marsala custard whisked to a foam

i. Origin & history

Zabaione is claimed by several parts of northern Italy, and its exact origin is lost among competing stories. Piedmont has the strongest attachment: in Turin it is associated with San Pasquale Baylon, a sixteenth-century Spanish Franciscan who became the patron saint of cooks and pastry makers, and the story goes that his name, rendered in Piedmontese as San Bajon, drifted into sambajon and then zabaione. Another legend credits a soldier of the Baglioni family in Emilia with improvising it from eggs, sugar and wine. Neither can be proved, and the word may simply derive from older terms for a frothy drink.

What is certain is that egg-and-wine preparations are very old in Italian cooking. Renaissance cookbooks include warm, spiced egg-and-wine creams, and zabaione belongs to that family of restorative, almost medicinal sweets. Until well into the twentieth century it was given to children, convalescents and new mothers as a fortifying breakfast, beaten with sugar and a splash of wine or even coffee.

Marsala, the fortified wine of western Sicily, is now considered the classic flavouring, though it only became a commercial wine in the late eighteenth century, so older zabaioni would have used other sweet wines. In Piedmont, Moscato d'Asti and other local sweet wines are common alternatives. The French adopted the dish as sabayon, which in classical French cooking can also be a savoury sauce made with yolks and white wine or Champagne.

The spellings are worth settling. Zabaione and zabaglione are both correct Italian; the first is more common in the north and in Italian dictionaries, the second is widespread in the south and abroad. Sabayon is the French name, and sambayón is the Spanish name used in Argentina and Uruguay, where Italian immigrants made it one of the most popular ice-cream flavours.

ii. How yolks hold a foam

Zabaione is a cooked egg-yolk foam. Whisking traps air bubbles in the liquid, and heat gradually unfolds the yolk proteins so that they form a fine network around those bubbles. That network is what lets the mixture triple in volume and hold its shape as a soft, spoonable mousse. Without heat, yolks and wine whisked together stay thin; with too much heat, the proteins tighten into scrambled egg.

The working range is narrow. The mixture starts to thicken noticeably at around 65 °C and is properly set at 70–78 °C. Above about 80 °C the yolks begin to curdle, so the bowl is set over barely simmering water and never over direct flame. Copper bowls, traditional in Italian kitchens for this purpose, conduct heat quickly and evenly; a thin stainless-steel or glass bowl works too, as long as the water below does not touch it.

Sugar and alcohol both help. Sugar dissolves into the yolks and raises the temperature at which the proteins set, giving a little more margin for error; the wine provides the liquid that becomes steam and adds to the volume. The old Italian rule of thumb captures the balance: for every egg yolk, one spoonful of sugar and two half-eggshells of Marsala.

The test of doneness is visual. Zabaione is ready when it has become pale and thick, when the whisk leaves trails that hold for a moment, and when a ribbon dropped from the whisk sits on the surface before sinking. Stop too early and it will separate in the glass, with liquid wine sinking beneath the foam.

iii. Ingredients

Makes 6 servings · scroll the side panel to adjust

• 6 very fresh egg yolks
• 90 g caster sugar
• 120 ml dry or sweet Marsala
• 1 pinch salt
• 300 g berries or sliced figs, to serve
• 12 savoiardi or other crisp biscuits, to serve

Use the freshest eggs possible, since the yolks are the whole dessert and are only lightly cooked. Marsala comes in dry (secco) and sweet (dolce) styles; either works, but a good Marsala Superiore gives a rounder, nuttier flavour than cheap cooking Marsala. Moscato, Vin Santo, sweet sherry or Madeira are all traditional alternatives. For a child-friendly or alcohol-free version, use strong espresso or orange juice in place of the wine; the foam will be slightly less stable. Caster sugar dissolves faster than granulated, which matters in a cooking time of just a few minutes.

iv. Method

1. Bring about 5 cm of water to a bare simmer in a saucepan. Choose a heatproof bowl that sits on top of the pan without touching the water.
2. Off the heat, put the yolks, sugar and salt in the bowl and whisk for 1–2 minutes until pale, thick and the sugar has started to dissolve.
3. Whisk in the Marsala, then set the bowl over the simmering water.
4. Whisk constantly, using a balloon whisk or a hand-held electric mixer on medium, reaching into the sides and bottom of the bowl. Over 6–10 minutes the mixture will turn frothy, then pale and voluminous, roughly tripling in size.
5. Keep going until the foam is thick enough to hold a ribbon for a few seconds and an instant-read thermometer shows about 75 °C. If it starts to look grainy at the edges, lift the bowl off the heat for a few seconds while still whisking.
6. Take the bowl off the heat and whisk for 30 seconds more so the residual heat does not overcook the base.
7. Spoon at once into glasses or over prepared fruit, and serve with the biscuits while still warm.

v. Tips & common mistakes

• Keep the water at a bare simmer. Boiling water overheats the bowl, and the yolks curdle on the bottom before the top is set. If you see scrambled flecks, move the bowl off the heat and whisk hard.
• Never stop whisking. Zabaione cooks in contact with the bowl. Every pause lets a layer of yolk set against the hot glass or metal.
• Do not stop too early. Undercooked zabaione looks foamy but collapses within minutes, leaving a layer of liquid wine at the bottom of the glass. Wait for the ribbon stage.
• Scale up with care. More than eight yolks takes much longer to heat evenly. For a crowd, make it in two batches.
• Serve immediately for a warm zabaione. It begins to deflate within ten minutes. For a version that will hold, chill it over iced water while whisking, then fold in whipped cream.
• Do not use a wide, shallow pan. A deep, round-bottomed bowl lets the whisk reach every part of the mixture and keeps the foam from spreading thin and overcooking.

vi. Variations

Cold zabaione, or crema allo zabaione, is whisked over ice once cooked and folded with whipped cream, giving a mousse that keeps for a day and is used to fill cakes and sandwich biscuits. Semifreddo allo zabaione freezes that mixture in a loaf tin, and zabaione gelato is a classic flavour in Italian gelaterias and, as sambayón, in Argentina. Some versions of tiramisu use a cooked zabaione base rather than raw yolks for the mascarpone cream.

In France, sabayon is made with Champagne or sweet white wine and often gratinéed briefly under a grill over berries. In the Alps, the warming bombardino served in ski huts is based on an egg liqueur in the same spirit. Britain's syllabub and posset are the nearest English relatives — wine or citrus set with cream rather than eggs — and zabaione is excellent spooned over biscotti or with crumbly sbrisolona.

vii. Serving & storage

Warm zabaione is served in stemmed glasses or small bowls, with savoiardi, lingue di gatto or baci di dama for dipping. It is also poured over fresh strawberries, raspberries, figs or peaches, and in winter over slices of panettone or pandoro. In Piedmont a spoonful sometimes accompanies a slice of hazelnut cake.

Warm zabaione does not keep; it should be made at the last moment, which takes less than ten minutes. The cold version with whipped cream will hold, covered, in the refrigerator for up to 24 hours. Frozen as a semifreddo, it keeps for up to a month. Leftover warm zabaione can be chilled and folded with whipped cream the next day rather than wasted.

ix. More from Italian

• Baci di Dama — hazelnut 'lady's kisses'
• Sbrisolona — Mantuan crumble cake
• Espresso Panna Cotta — set coffee cream
• Tartufo — ice-cream truffle
• Syllabub — English wine cream
• Torrija — Spanish wine-soaked toast