Gâteau Nantais

A secret (pastry) worth sharing

I dream with my eyes open. - Jules Verne

The gâteau nantais, like the crêmet d’Anjou, is one of those desserts that won’t be found in many cookbooks. Both of these confections are local specialities, and “local” in France, no matter the small size of the country and how close we all are to each other, means truly and emphatically local. Unlike its cousin, the gâteau breton, the gâteau nantais never traveled beyond the city limits of its hometown, Nantes, in the west of France. Astounding for such a unique and delicious pastry. Yet even in Nantes, it rather fell into oblivion for many years until Biscuiterie LU, famous for the Petit Beurre butter cookies, brought it back to popularity in 1910.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s start at the beginning and that takes us to the French city of Nantes. 

Nantes is a city of history, both past and present, embracing and owning her tumultuous past while carving her own future out of exotic wood, aluminum, glass, and daring. Her marketplace and monuments breathe France and her traditions, city of Dukes, yet innovation has always been a sure sign of her forward-thinking, progressive personality. Henri IV selected Nantes to be the signature city of his famous Edict in 1598, an order of tolerance and religious freedom; former capital of Brittany, Nantes was the home of Anne de Bretagne, Duchess of Brittany, married to two kings of France yet a woman who managed to keep power and control of her duchy firmly in her own hands, then guaranteeing it passed on to her daughter, while assuring its future unification with France.

In 1826, Nantes became the city with the first public transportation system in the world, in the form of horse-drawn omnibuses. And just over 50 years later, the world’s first tramway line operated by a compressed air propulsion system was installed in Nantes. And Biscuiterie LU (Lefèvre-Utile), one of Nantes’ most famous brand names, once the popularity of their cookies took off and their company grew (14 to 1200 workers in 30 years, producing more than 200 types of cookies), modernized their mechanical operations, their method of packaging and marketing, and, most significantly, the treatment of their workers, creating a profit-sharing system, an emergency relief fund, and offering free medical care. 

And was it this city’s innovative spirit that inspired native son - and visionary - Jules Verne to imagine futuristic worlds where rockets landed on the moon, submarines were propelled under the seas by electricity, or the building of water and hydrogen-fueled societies, this natural resource furnishing an “inexhaustible source of heat and light”?

The Jules Verne mural in Nantes.

Yet, like all French cities, the light and dark clash, a never-ending struggle in the history books; her valiant resistance during the French Revolution or the World Wars stands elbow to elbow with her turbulent role in the Commerce Triangulaire, the Slave Trade. Once one of Europe’s richest, largest, most important port cities, she built much of her fortune on this trade of humans for goods, vanilla and spices, cane sugar, tobacco and rum, and her shipping magnates became very wealthy indeed.

Nantes’ involvement in the slave trade weighs so very heavily on this beautiful city; the Mémorial de l'Abolition de l'Esclavage, Memorial to the Abolition of Slavery, the largest such monument in the world, nestles on the banks of the Loire River that flows through Nantes, the heartbeats and tears of how many men and women held captive still pulsing up through the water, through the sidewalks where wealthy merchants once sauntered, ghostly water lapping up against the sides of ships where captains once shouted orders and goods were unloaded onto the bustling, crowded quays. The streets we walk over were once a part of this river, now sand and asphalt and tar, filled in and paved over in an effort to move forward into a new era. Yet the sidewalks still groan under the weight of the majestic apartment buildings, elegant swirls of dark ironwork against the pure, snowy white stone, homes now buckling under the weight of time, the same once built for those merchants in their glory years of the 18th and 19th centuries, apartments that never let us forget. And which now look upon this memory, this monument to the men, women, and children upon whose backs their wealth was built.

Nantes built her fortune on trade with the French West Indies, former trade partners, former colonies. Ships based in Nantes would be sent to Africa where their captains would exchange European goods for men and women who would then, in turn, be brought to the Caribbean to work on the sugar, tobacco, and spice plantations. The ships would then return to Nantes, bringing vanilla, pepper, ginger, cinnamon, tobacco, and cane sugar to Europe, adding, in the 19th Century, rum to their cargo. These exotic ingredients quickly became part of Nantes’ commercial and culinary repertoire, enriching the gastronomic pleasures of this part of the world. It is difficult to find a local sweet specialty that isn’t spiked with either rum or Muscadet, her own local wine.

Nantes, being such an important port city, seeing ships - and sailors and travelers - coming and going in a never ending flow, saw a rapid succession of businesses, pastry shops and factories, setting up specifically to produce gâteaux de voyage, cakes or cookies that would travel well, that would last a week or longer, primarily for sailors heading out to sea but also happily purchased by more worldly, sometimes wealthy travelers; Mme de Sévigné… 17th century marquise… apparently wrote to her daughter about the gâteaux de voyage she had commissioned from her pastry chef that would last the week it took to travel from the Château de Versailles to Brittany.

While a gâteau de voyage usually referred to a hard, flat cookie - a biscuit or bis-cuit, twice cooked - so hard, in fact, that the sailors took to the custom of dunking the cookies in rum until they were soft enough to eat, any pastry that would remain moist and flavorful throughout an entire trip over land or on water was called a gâteau de voyage. And our gâteau nantais, Nantes’ cake, is considered the very first gâteau de voyage. 

There are a few legends that feed into the lore of the origins of this marvelous pastry; that it was created by a pastry chef in Nantes, jealous of the popularity of the rum-infused baba au rhum in 18th century Paris; or that it was inspired by the sailors habit of soaking those hard cookies, sometimes made with almonds, in rum before enjoying them; or it could simply be, most probably have been invented by M. Rouleau, a maître fouacier, a baker specialized in the local fouace, a brioche-like bread in the form of a crown scented with both rum and orange flower water, in Nantes in 1820, inspired by the exotic ingredients that had, by this time, become forever tied to this city and now readily available. 

When its popularity waned several decades later, the folks at Biscuiterie LU decided to begin producing gâteau nantais in 1910, bringing this confection back, once again, into fashion and making it available to locals who have kept it a very good secret since.

The gâteau nantais is a densely satisfying cake, rich in finely ground almonds, drenched in amber rum, and cloaked under its familiar white icing, this combination creating such a moist cake that it would surely last a week or more, if one could keep from eating it that long. Sweet and sassy to be eaten just a sliver at a time, the gâteau nantais quickly becomes addictive with its intriguing flavor and drunken bite. And like this magnificent city that lends her name to this elegant pastry, the gâteau nantais is easy and smooth, infused with the flavors of the past yet rich with a modern kick savored by the locals who know it and love it so well.

Don’t let the list of ingredients or the recipe’s 3 parts discourage any of you who are novice bakers: the gâteau nantais is extremely easy to make, the syrup and icing themselves taking only minutes to put together. Just carefully read the headnotes and then the entire recipe before beginning to make sure you have everything and understand the timeline of the preparation. 

Gâteau nantais

Serves 8 to 10 people

Salted butter must be used in this recipe, as it is in all traditional recipes of Nantes, once the capital of Brittany where sea salt is harvested.

You will need an 8 - or 8 ½ - inch (22 cm) round cake pan with sides at least 2 inches high.

For the syrup

5 tablespoons (75 grams) granulated sugar

⅔ liquid cup (155 ml) water

For the cake and icing

Scant 9 tablespoons (125 grams) salted butter, at room temperature, plus more for the pan

¾ cup (150 grams) granulated sugar

Generous 1 ¼ to 1 ½ cups (125 grams) finely ground almonds (almond meal/flour)

3 eggs, lightly beaten

⅓ cup (40 grams) all-purpose flour

⅜  liquid cup (100 ml) dark or amber rum

⅞ cup (3 ½ ounces, 100 grams) powdered/confectioners' sugar

Prepare the rum syrup: Place the 5 tablespoons (75 grams) granulated sugar and ⅔ cup (155 ml) water into a saucepan and place over medium heat; stir constantly until the sugar is dissolved. As soon as the liquid comes to a rolling boil, remove the pan from the heat and set aside to cool to room temperature.

Prepare the cake: Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Butter a 22 cm (8 to 8 ½ inch) cake pan at least 2-inches deep (no bigger, no smaller), line with a circle of parchment paper, then butter the paper lightly.

In a large mixing bowl, beat the softened butter with the granulated sugar with an electric beater (or in a stand mixer) until blended, light, and fluffy. Add and beat in the ground almonds until well blended.

Beat in the lightly beaten eggs in 3 or 4 additions until well blended.

Add the flour and 3 tablespoons of the rum to the batter and beat just until blended to create a smooth, thick batter.

Pour the batter into the pan and spread evenly. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes until just set in the center and the cake begins to pull away from the sides of the pan; the finished cake should be a deep blond/golden color. If the cake looks to be browning too quickly, cover the top loosely with a sheet of aluminum foil during the last 10 or 15 minutes. 

Your sugar syrup should now be cool. Stir 4 tablespoons of the remaining rum into the syrup.

As soon as the cake is out of the oven, slide a knife around the edges to loosen the cake from the sides of the pan then carefully turn out onto a rack, peel off the parchment paper then flip upright onto another cooling rack. Immediately brush generously with about half of the rum-spiked sugar syrup. Allow the cake to cool completely.

Once the cake is cool, brush again with the remaining rum-spiked sugar syrup (you might not use all of the rum syrup).

Make the icing: Whisk the rest of the rum into the powdered/confectioner’s sugar until very smooth, adding just a bit more rum or water until the icing is just thick enough to cling to the cake yet just thin enough to be easy to drizzle (like royal icing). Using a spatula or offset knife, spread the icing over the top of the cake, allowing it to drip down the sides if you like.

Let the gâteau nantais rest and macerate for the day, allowing the rum syrup to soak into the cake and the icing to set before enjoying.

The gâteau nantais should be served in thin wedges.

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