Savarin Made from a yeast dough, like babas, but without the currants, savarins are baked in large or small ring molds, soaked with a syrup usually flavored with rum or kirsch and then painted with a fruit glaze. The center of the ring is filled with whipped cream or pastry cream, and sometimes fresh or poached fruit is added. Sponge Cake Sponge cakes are leavened by beating air into whole eggs and sugar or by beating the sugar with the yolks and whites separately. The cakes tend to be fairly lean, even when they contain butter, and are often split into layers, moistened with a flavored sugar syrup and filled. When sugar is dissolved in water and brought to a boil, it forms a solution called a syrup.
Simple syrup is made with equal quantities of sugar and water.
As the syrup boils, the sugar becomes more concentrated and the syrup more dense. The various stages of the cooked sugar solution can be measured with a candy thermometer. Simple syrup is used to moisten cakes, and sugar cooked to various stages is used in the making of fondant, buttercream, boiled icing, and Italian meringue. Sugarcooked to between 320 and 350 degrees becomes caramel, which is used for glazing and making spun sugar, caramel cages and praline paste. Back to Caramel.