Trio, Trio, I Want A Trio, And I Want One Now

You know what it's like. I'm sure it's happened to us all. At least once. You wait for quite a while for a Fanny Cradock recipe with Greengages to come along. Years go by. Nothing. Not a plum. Then three appear all at the same time. Fanny calls them 'Reines-Claude'. What are the chances? They are all quite different. How do you choose which one to go with. Two are sweet. One is savoury. You've got lots of Greengages as they are bang in season. The supermarket has them on special offer. The timing is perfect. Could not have been better. Apart from the choices. Why choose when the choice is obvious? Make all three! Fanny would surely be delighted with a Reines-Claude Ménage à Trois...

Fanny starts it all off with a jelly. She loves jelly. This one is a sweet version of her classic Aspic. She loves Aspic. Fanny makes it with plums. I make mine with Bramble Jelly, heating and setting it with Agar powder instead of gelatine, of course. It needs to be set in a shallow tin, so that the required circle of it can be 'stamped' out. While it's setting, Fanny halves and poaches some peaches, in a simple sugar syrup. When poached, they are fished out and dried on ordinary kitchen paper. The Greengages are also poached in the syrup, but left whole, otherwise they will lose their shape. When they are done they are not dried off, instead rolled in milled pistachio nuts, ready for assembly. The peach goes on top of the jelly, and the greengage goes on top of the peach. All that goes on top of all that is a little leaf of garnish - and you have Les Reines-Claude Savoyarde. Please warn your guests about the stone.

All this greengaging is new to me, especially using them for a savoury salad. No poaching required. Fanny takes a silver knife and cuts a cross across the top of each greengage, opening each fruit into four petals, without pushing them so far back that they would split. Very carefully, the stone is removed. In it's place a mixture of cream cheese, cream, seasoning and more milled nuts is piped. Then dusted with paprika. Fanny recommends serving these well chilled on a lettuce leaf. Greengage and Chill. She presents for you Hors d'Oeuvre des Reines-Claude.

Without a blink of an eye, it's back to the poaching. More greengages are submerged in extremely gently heated sugar syrup, whole again. This time they are bashed a bit to release the stone when they have collapsed, and the flesh is pulped in a blender. One of my very favourite phrases follows. Add custard. Whip them together and turn them into 'snow' by adding whipped egg whites. Fanny then piles the mixture into glasses and tops with 'spirals' of cream. That's piped by the way. Les Reines-Claude en Neige could not be otherwise.

What if, unlike me, you don't happen to have a steady supply of greengages at exactly the right time when Fanny decides to feature them? She has purposely kept the recipes simple so that alternatives can be substituted. Fanny says to start thinking about Plums. Go on. Start. Maybe Apricots? How about Damsons? Have you considered Mirabelles, or Cherry Plums to you and I? Even white or black grapes would do, if you are really stuck. Fanny has one last suggestion though, which she's borrowed from X. Marcel Boulestin, who was the very first television celebrity chef on the BBC. Or as Fanny refers to him, 'that great amateur chef.' Green tomatoes were his idea. He loved them in jams, chutneys, pickles and, surprisingly, omelettes too. Fanny says they would be perfect in all these recipes des Reines-Claude. Yes, including the splendid flurry of Snow...

Something Old, Something Choux, Something Borrowed, Something Blue

I absolutely love buying cookbooks. You won't be a bit surprised, I'm sure. I utterly love old cookbooks with their fascinating diagrams, captivating descriptions and gripping details. I'm never happier than rummaging in a second hand bookshop, finding an unusual, un-used gem or a well-loved family favourite. I also entirely love new cookbooks, so much so that my bookshelves are groaning. I tend to be restrained (or I try to be), even occasionally have I been known to donate no-longer used books to make room for new ones. Sometimes. OK, not often. I buy more shelves.

Occasionally I buy a new book and inside I find something old. This happened recently when I trotted into my local Waterstones on the way to work (yes, it's a morning priority) hoping to spy the latest book from Justin Gellatly and the team at Bread Ahead - Bread School. There it was. On the shelf. Calling my name. I read it on the walk to work (apologies if I bumped into you). Sneaked a peek at my desk (sorry to my boss if you are reading this). Flicked through at lunchtime (which may have been extended). Lost myself in it on the train home (which for once seemed to fly past). So many wonderful, modern, classic, innovative recipes. Then, there it was. Page 166. 'French Baking', indeed. Swoon. Fanny's favourite, the Choux Swan.

They are so retro. So adorable. So effective. I think I love Choux Swans almost as much as Fanny did. People often associate them with the 1970s, but they've been around longer and feature in Fanny's cookbooks stretching right back. It makes me smile so much to see them in a new, hip, must-have book, I just have to try the recipe and see how they compare to Fanny's. I made Choux Swans over the summer at my Fanny Cradock demo at Foodies Festival with the lovely Restoration Cake. Of course, with Fanny's signature blue cream filling. The crowd seemed to love them, and I loved seeing pictures of the sweet little swans I made for the audience appearing across social media. Who doesn't love a Blue Choux Swan?

People can get a little scared of choux pastry, but you needn't be. Fanny has her rules to follow, as ever, which are a little different to the mainstream. So I mostly follow the Bread Ahead methods and throw in some Fanny for good measure. All choux starts with melting butter in a liquid. Here, it's milk and water. Fanny uses all sorts, including orange juice, for hers, depending on the occasion. The Bread Ahead guys use bread flour, so I do too. A little sugar, some salt. All gently mingling. Then boiling. Then flour added in and mixed. Then eggs beaten in one at a time. Fanny then leaves it cool, until it is stone cold. Other recipes don't. Fanny says it's the only way to ensure there is no 'nasty goo' inside the baked buns. I don't want goo. Stone cold it is.

Fanny loved piping. I love piping. The Bread Ahead Swan bodies are piped with a star nozzle. I rather like the idea. The Swan necks are piped through a small round nozzle. The necks bake for eight minutes, the bodies for twenty-two. Both emerge from the oven looking resplendently golden, but not so pretty. The tops are sliced off the bodies and cut in half to make wings. The cavity is filled with glorious piped custard or cream. Or both. Blue colouring is optional required. Wings are placed. Finally the necks and head are attached, and voilà, a splendid Swan appears from the ugly duckling. Fanny suggests insists that they are displayed on a mirrored surface to resemble a lake. Please You Must join me, Fanny and Bread Ahead, in #BringingRetroBack.

Real Wild Rothschild

Picture the scene. You're enjoying a fabulous dinner in a fabulous Château in a fabulous area of the fabulous Médoc in fabulous France. You're hosts are fabulous. Everything is fabulous. Of course it is, you are dining with the fabulous Rothschild wine family at their fabulous Château Rothschild. It's hard to get more blooming fabulous. Everyone is enjoying the fabulous meal. You suddenly have a fabulous idea. You'd love to recreate this fabulous dish at home. Surely you're fabulous hosts wouldn't mind sharing the fabulous recipe with you? Would they?

As you might imagine, Fanny was not shy in asking. Without any whiff of social embarrassment, she boldly asked for the recipe. I can still hear the *gasp* now. The dish she had enjoyed so much was called Gâteau Rothschild. The clue is in the name. A treasured family meal of layered late summer vegetables. Presumably goes perfectly with a large glass (or two) or red. Initially, the chef was extremely reluctant to share the recipe with Fanny. After all, it was a closely guarded family secret. And she was known for sharing them in print. For profit. The recipe is contained in their treasured private family 'receipt' book. So, probably, you'd just say 'I understand' and leave without the famous recipe. Not Fanny. She wanted that book.

Knowing the time would come when she too would want to impress a crowd, maybe of hungry vegetarians, she persisted to try and secure the secret. The chef, however, would not budge. Nothing stops Fanny as we know, so she went straight to her hosts to explain the reluctance. Not embarrassing at all. The fabulousness suddenly left the room. It worked however, and they asked the chef to prise open the old, valuable, sentimental, family cookbook and let Fanny get her hands on it. Except the chef insisted on simply verbally telling Fanny the recipe making her use all her powers of memory to retain it until she had a chance to jot it down.

She did though, and then shared it with us all. Naturally. How kind of her to lay bare the family showstopper. It is essentially a layered bake with seasonal vegetables. Courgettes. Onions. Tomatoes. Peppers. Mushrooms. Fanny says it is one of the most delicious and rather time demanding vegetable 'assembly' dishes that she knows of. Clearly not suitable for general family meals (unless you happen to be the Rothschilds) but entirely suitable for entertaining. I take some shortcuts though as time is tighter and it's the chefs night off...

I think Fanny, and perhaps even the Rothschilds themselves, would approve. Fanny laboriously cooks each vegetable separately in pans of foaming butter. Very French. It's important to keep them all separate for the presentation. I slice them thickly, pop them on a tray and roast them in the oven. Once baked, I layer them in a metal ring with alternate layers of a mix of cheese and breadcrumbs, before baking again. Fanny is very particular on the assembly. It must be onion first, then tomato, peppers and finally courgettes. In that order. My final rebellion is to include Aubergine, which I put first. Then, bake again and serve with a tomato sauce, which Fanny calls a fondue. This is how the Rothschild Family served it, and so must we. It was indeed fabulous. I don't imagine, however, that Fanny was ever invited to the Château for Gâteau again.