Shakin' Up Your Soda

Fanny says that she seems to acquire children at an alarming rapidity. She says that there is always a gaggle of other people's about, as well as her own. The truth is probably somewhat different, given the reports that she had a often difficult relationship with her children, who she seemingly abandoned along the way. Perhaps she's getting confused. It's the summer heat. It's the summer holidays. She claims to love children, but admits that they can be a confounded nuisance under her feet when she is extremely busy, which is all the time as we know. One answer she has at her disposal whenever possible is to turn them out into the garden, terrace, local field or playground (seemingly anywhere), if it is not pouring with rain. Perhaps that's where she misplaced her own offspring...

Tupperware seems to be the other solution. And a large bell. Oh and a split stable door in the kitchen leading out to the garden. At meal times she rings the bell (or presumably gets someone else to do it, why bother ringing your own bell when an assistant can do it for you?) and doles out, in plastic beakers, hot soup or cold drinks, depending on the vagaries of the English weather, and a filled luncheon box for each child, or teenager. Only adults are allowed indoors. Meals are dispensed over the half-open stable door, meaning there is no need to lay a table or do any clearing up. Or let the young ones inside ever. Fanny says that they prefer it this way, and frankly so does she.

So what does she pop into these primitive 'Happy Meals'? The contents need to be filling and easy for Mums to prepare. Who wants to spend their days wondering 'What on earth can I give them today?' Housewives should be able to keep them relatively happy without killing themselves with extra cooking from now until they go back to school again. Perhaps that's when Fanny opens both parts of the split stable door and lets them back into the house? Although, with some attempt at compassion and empathy, Fanny does share that at that time the house returns to being like a morgue through which a hurricane has spread. She is so full of contradictions.

Today she suggests a simple soda bread to keep them fully amused. Quick to make, filling and tasty, it meets all the requirements. She borrows the recipe from a 'super-Mum' she knows who has seven children and still manages to be a championship golfer as well as run her home without help, dye and lay her own carpets, make tents, clothing and curtains, and even do her own carpentry and electrical work. So Soda Bread should be a doddle. Mix the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and cream of tartar in a bowl. Rub in some butter, add in buttermilk and mix to a dough. If you're feeling fancy, add cheese. I do. Or if you think they are in the mood for sweet, add sugar and sultanas. Shape, mark with a deep cross and bake for half an hour and you are good to start flinging it into tupperware tubs and tossing it over the half-opened stable door as you head out for a round of golf. Perfect parenting.

It's a little flat and scone-like, but a tasty treat all the same. Well, it will do. Minimum effort and all that. The little dears will need a drink to wash it down though. Fanny laments that we are not more like the French, who will give their little monsters youngsters watered down wine from age five onwards. Instead she suggests a Milkshake. Made from vegetables. They'll, erm, never guess. She whizzes up grated carrot, diced celery, chopped parsley, watercress and spinach with a little milk, fresh orange juice and water, before passing through a sieve to remove all traces of leftover veg. She whizzes again with added yoghurt and serves the frothy creation with straws, and at least one ice cube per child. You wouldn't want to be cruel to the children on a hot day now, would you?

Holy Moly Roly Poly

Fanny Cradock certainly had a vivid imagination. Maybe freaky. Some of her earliest books were written for Children, and were lovingly illustrated. Perfect bedtime stories filled with magical creatures, all with familiar names, who got themselves into a series of relatable mishaps in fancied worlds and landscapes. Things could've been very different if the children books themselves had been enough to keep a good income flowing in for Fanny, instead she looked beyond her charming tales towards food.

We know, however, that she made the most of her fanciful visions in the food that she created too. Maybe freaky. Often she combined her two worlds into one, and made up things for the young folks to make while their parents busied themselves working through her proper recipes. Her creations might've looked quite at home nestled aside the grown-up recipes as they were often just as colourful, just as over the top and just as bonkers.

Perhaps Fanny and just been to the Circus, with some rather tipsy clowns rolling into town to entertain her and Johnnie, as she thinks that 'tumbling roly-poly clowns' are ideal for the small fry to make, for no other apparent reason other than for belly laughs. Maybe freaky. Made simply from fondant icing and a few chocolate twigs, there will be no clowning around in the kitchen today.

Fanny suggests colouring up some plain, white fondant with any harmless vegetable colouring that you like, there is no need to copy her idea of one pink and one blue clown. Maybe freaky. My fondant is ready-coloured for ease, so I'm sticking with red and blue. Fanny makes her chocolate 'twig' arms and legs with softened chocolate dribbled onto greaseproof paper and cooled, but I'm a step ahead...

Fanny rolls large balls, about the size of tennis balls, for fat bodies, and smaller balls, about the size of ping-pong balls, for heads, to start her clowns transformation to animation. She glues them together with a little egg white. She makes little hats, little eyes, little noses, little mouths, little ears and little spots for their outfits. All from fondant, although the mouths can be little scraps of glacé cherry if you wish. Once assembled, Fanny uses a cocktail stick to gouge out a little hole to stick in the arms and legs at jaunty angles. To make it look as if the clowns are rolling about and laughing, you see. Fanny suggests that you can even pop along to your local travelling circus and scramble under the marquee to collect some soil for them to rollick around in. Although if you do so, Fanny warns you not to eat this. That would be freaky.

They Eat Horses, Don't They?

These days it is dead popular to hide things in food for children to get them to eat the stuff they wouldn't normally choose. Usually healthy items, like vegetables. Fanny Cradock had a very different perspective I think, she liked to encourage the little ones to make their own bits and pieces, knowing that they'd be more likely to eat their own creations. Each part of the weekly series ends with a 'recipe' for small fry, quite unlike anything you'd see today. Either that or Fanny thought the wee ones needed some extra encouragement to eat more biscuits and chocolate...?

I know what you are thinking - biscuits and chocolate, it must be chocolate biscuits? Clearly just having chocolate biscuits alone is just not enough for Fanny. Where would the fun be in taking ordinary shop bought biscuits and adding your own chocolate? Well, it sounds ok to me, and would surely keep the nippers quiet for a while at least? But no, Fanny has to take it to a different level, naturally, transforming the ordinary shortbread biscuits into horses.

Yes, horses. It wouldn't be my first thought either. Perhaps some of Fannys friends with children (did she have any?) were equine obsessed, and needed little horse-shaped snacks to take to the gymkhana? Fanny makes it all sound so easy, simply cut the shortbread biscuits in half and scoop out a little circle from the middle to give the impression of legs. I ended up with half a packet of broken biscuits as they crumbled either when cutting or scooping. My knife cut them into many bits, and the piping nozzle I used to create the 'scoop' shattered those that survived. It was like a nightmare Grand National where only one or two made it past the finish line.

Perhaps Fanny smashed all her biscuits too, she doesn't let on, but she uses little off-cuts to make the horses heads and tails by sticking them on with some melted chocolate. She uses ordinary milk chocolate, but I have white. My horses I feel need to be grander. Fanny has given me aspiration, if nothing else. In sticking on the heads and tails there are a few more breaks and mishaps, so the chocolate becomes more like glue, which is quite ironic.

Finally the 'horses' are dipped in the remaining melted chocolate, which is easier said than done, to cover them before being decorated with eyes (little silver balls which ended up all over the house when I dropped the box), saddles and reigns. Fanny makes hers from almond paste, but I have some cake modelling sugar paste for mine. Just not sure what to do with all those broken biscuits, apart from scooping them up and eating them myself... Fanny displays her horses in an inedible field of fake grass, and gives them a bowl of nuts to 'eat'. I've spent the best part of an hour collecting up little silver balls, so mine are left to frolic carousel-like on an orange-half with the aid of some well-placed cocktail sticks. I'm not so sure any children of today would be impressed, they wouldn't win the dressage would they?

Too selfish to keep these treasures to myself, I am entering them in this months Treat Petite, hosted by Cakeyboi this month, (Baking Explorer Kat will be sorry to miss these) which has an 'Anything Goes' theme. These fit so well, don't you think?

Wee Blind Mice

Fanny and Johnnie liked to think that they captured the imagination of everyone interested in cooking, even children. They appeared on Children's TV programmes as early as 1958 in a show called Lucky Dip. Apparently this led to 'record-breaking fan-mail' from their young audience and further slots on a show called Tuesday Rendezvous (which was also shown on Fridays, obviously) and even a series of cookbooks for children. The Cradocks love affair with children is brought into question with the books' titles though. Would you purchase a set of books for your wee dears called 'Happy Cooking Children'?

For Fanny, Children's Cookery had to have all the excitement and colour found in the great classical writings (we can presume she means her own here), but with added WHY's and HOW's for the young fans. She believed in 'safety first' to protect the smallest readers from any chance mishaps. Especially for garnish. Fanny recognised that young cooks loved to arrange and decorate, so she made sure that she provided stimulating ideas with 'only simple, inexpensive, edible trimmings' to be used by small chefs.

The weekly partwork always had something for the 'small fry' to try. They didn't often make a great deal of sense, but it was Fannys attempt to inspire. Who wouldn't be inspired by chocolate mice nibbling cheese? These little mischiefs are made from meringues, one of Fannys starter recipes, so perfect for wee ones. Once whisked up, they simply need to be shaped 'like mice' by doming them between two oiled dessertspoons and dried out in a low oven. Fanny's Top Tip - Try to make sure they are flat bottomed, broad in the behind and narrow to the nose. Easier said than done, for beginners. As she is keeping it simple for the children, she refrains from saying 'quenelle' but that's what she means.

With safety first in mind, Fanny suggests melting the chocolate to coat them by taking a packet of chocolate chips, plonking them in a bowl and whacking it on the bottom of the low oven until a wooden spoon can make them a bit squidgy. Then, beat them 'very hard' until they are smooth. Just as well to introduce the super keen young ones to Fannys favourite techniques at an early age. I opt for both milk and white chocolate chips, just to be fancy. The cooked meringues are them 'wiggled' in the chocolate and their 'overcoats' left to dry on greaseproof paper.

To complete the illusion of mice, small slivers of almond are added for ears, and I've added sugar balls for eyes. Fanny is always one for realism though - so mice must have tails. She suggests cutting small lengths of string, dipping them in the melted chocolate and attaching them. So bang goes the 'safety first' message. How many poor wee inspired souls choked on the string tails I wonder? Fanny justifies this veering from the rules by pointing out that Sugar Mice you buy in shops have string tails, so that's OK then. Authenticity. To delight the little ones' parents to the point of no return, the completed mice should be displayed a top a large chunk of big holed Emmental Cheese. Fanny warns us not to be fooled by our sneaky cheesemonger keen to sell us the more expensive and smaller holed Gruyère. I say set the chocolate mice on him should he try...

I'm entering this into the new challenge linky thing from Belleau Kitchen, Simply Eggcellent, which celebrates all things eggs, check out all the other ideas so far! 

Specially for Small Fry

Fanny was always keen to get youngsters involved in cooking, and the weekly Cradock Cookery Programme was no exception - each installment included a page 'specially for small fry'. I'm not too sure what today's Junior Masterchef and Junior Bake-off hopefuls would've made of it, but for Fanny it was important that the young generation followed in the footsteps of 'their grown ups' and embraced the 'above all garnish and presentation' mantra. Fanny and Johnnie had already published several cookbooks aimed at young people, and had even produced a special children's cookery TV programme as early as 1959, which of course had it's own range of cookbooks to match - Fanny was never one to miss a marketing opportunity.

The first few ideas for the youngsters to get their heads around involve no cooking whatsoever, just assembly. Fanny kicks off with an idea for Stuffing Ducks. Fanny suggests that the grown-ups give their usual and ordinary stuffing used for birds or meats to the children instead to fashion these cute little ducks. The construction instructions are simple, wash your hands, mould the body, head and then finish off with an almond beak. I have used my trusty Vegetarian Haggis from Macsweens here instead, how do they look?

For pudding it's slightly more complicated as we attempt Edible Clowns. The youngsters are trusted to melt chocolate very carefully and mould it around a half orange to make a cup which is then released from the orange and filled with ice-cream. This is topped with a scoop of ice-cream and some chocolate petals to form a Pierots ruffle, a few chopped pieces of glacé cherry and a cone hat... Voilà the edible clown.  

The final in this initial trio of treats for the young at heart seems decidedly risqué in appearance in this day and age, however I am hoping that Fanny designed it with innocence. I am worried that this blog will get banned as a result, but here goes. For Banana Candles, all you need is an ordinary banana, coated with strawberry jam, rolled in chopped nuts and stood up in a few pineapple rings. Oh, and topped off with a glacé cherry flame. I think bananas must have been straighter back in the 1970s, but even so how many parents would be able to keep a straight face if presented with these?

They all tasted just fine, and I am sure were a fun way to get young folk involved and interested in food. It will be interesting to see how Fanny develops the skills of these small fry as the parts progress, but for now I don't think we'll be seeing any of these creations on Junior Masterchef - which is a shame as I'd love to see those judges faces when presented with a Banana Candle...