Cat Got Your Tongue?

Some days we all just want to keep things low key. We might be feeling a little bit quiet. We might be feeling a little bit flat. We might be feeling just a little bit ordinary. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing much to shout about. Maybe we just want to have something comforting and familiar in our lives. Fanny always has the answer, and it's usually cake. As it happens her solution here is her 'signature' with a twist. The cake is normally flat, normally ordinary, always comforting, always familiar. So, imagine it with oooopmh, and you have her Swiss Roll, presented as a Gâteau...

Fanny has her own ideas on how a Swiss Roll should be made, and we've made them a few times together before. For my money, they always work, always produce a light, spongey cake panel and always go down well. She shoots hot sugar into eggs as they whisk, until a light, yellow, fluffy double-in-size mixture is created begging for you to fold in some flour and bake. She calls it the 'Swiss Roll Which Will Never Crack', and like her smile, it doesn't.

This time, Fanny bakes it in a perfectly ordinary 8-inch round cake tin, all lined and ready with greaseproof paper. It bakes for longer than an ordinary, flat Swiss Roll, but comes out just as springy and light. Fanny splits it carefully with a large knife and spreads it either with homemade jam, or when it is available scum from the jam. Yes, scum. Perhaps she really means something very different, she often does, but to me scum is the frothy stuff that rises to the top when you make jam. You skim it off and throw it away. Does Fanny really spread it in her cakes?

I don't have any to hand regardless, so use my homemade Bramble Jelly. We know how Fanny loves a Bramble. In addition to spreading it in the middle and 'clapping' the two halves together again, Fanny brushes it all over the sponge. It feels a little wrong, am I reading the instructions correctly? I should really have more faith in dear old Fanny, soon all becomes clear. She has plans. It's all methodical. Panic over. It's not only for taste, but also for glue.

Fanny takes some Langues de Chat (Cats' Tongues) biscuits that are either homemade or shop bought (I bought some this time), brushes them with more jam and dips them in freshly milled pistachios. She knows this is rather extravagant, so it remains optional. Then, they are stuck round the outside of the gâteau. The glue-jam helps them to stand proudly. A cheerful border of freshly whipped cream, a little icing sugar and a whipped egg white is piped around the inside, before the centre is piled high with the chosen berries. Fanny choses blackcurrants. I chose blueberries. Suddenly the day feels less flat, less ordinary and more familiar as I tuck quietly into a hearty slice of this satisfyingly spongey surprise. And *maybe* another one too. Just don't shout about it.

Tongue Twister - Fanny's Faux Funghi Feline Flan

Fanny recommends a sponge flan ring for this Tarte aux Champignons, but the only instruction she gives is 'bake the case'... I like to think that maybe it's a typo and what she really meant was 'buy the case', so before I convince myself otherwise I pop to the supermarket and purchase a pre-baked one, for the first time in my life, honestly. Am I getting 'flanned-out' with this partwork?

While at the supermarket I search high and low for the next ingredient - a box of Langues de Chat (French Cats' Tongues) biscuits. There are none to be found, and several supermarkets later and perhaps a bit of guilt at the bought flan case, I resolve to make my own. Fanny doesn't give a recipe, but there is one in my Leiths Baking Bible, and it seems quite simple - beat butter and sugar, add some vanilla (I use my trusty Little Pods), fold in some egg whites, add plain flour. Ooh, Fanny wouldn't like the plain flour, but this isn't her recipe. 

I pipe the Cats' Tongues mixture into small lines, tap out the bubbles and bake for only eight minutes until the are crisp at the edges and golden in colour.

Fanny instructs me to trim their bases, and stand them round the flan ring before filling the centre with a mixture of stiffly whipped double cream and trusty confectioners custard before chilling in the fridge to set while making the meringue mushrooms. 

Yes, meringue mushrooms. Luckily Fanny has already taught me how to make meringues in various shapes and sizes, but mushrooms are a new one to me. The ingredients are the same - egg whites, sugar and a little cocoa powder for decoration. After whipping up the meringue mixture I find myself piping again. I need to pipe little stalks for the mushrooms and also some domed tops. They dry out in the oven before dusting the tops with the cocoa powder.

They actually make very cute looking mushrooms when assembled, sticking together with a little cream. Fanny is right, as ever.

All that's left to do is complete the assembly. This basically involves piling the mushrooms as high as possible atop the flan. Fanny suggests if any of this confuses me I should simply turn to the picture which a poor junior student, Dianne, put together without any instructions. The picture shows a flan with meringue mushrooms piled on top. I wonder if poor Dianne popped out the shops too when Fanny wasn't looking?