A Whack of Leather - Our Third Fanny-versary!

Three really is a magic number, but sometimes it feels a little overlooked. I mean everyone likes a 'first' don't they? Nothing better. The Winner! The Original! The Pioneer! Second feels like a real achievement, having kept going and 'done it again', still pretty good compared to first. Third though, it's a bit like, okay, that's great. A kind of 'well done' but also a 'what's for tea' kind of celebration really. So, it may just be me, but today I am shouting it loud and cheering (for myself) as Fanny and I celebrate a terrific three years together. Aw. That's 'leather' in anniversary terms... Oh. Best move on.

Three years! You may not have been reading along from the very beginning (erm, but now I think of it, what not?), but that's a lot of weird and whacky recipes, a lot food colouring and a lot of mentions of poor, down-trodden assistants getting into hot water for not following instructions. That's probably where the leather comes in - a quick whack with a belt? It's also three years of learning new techniques, uncovering new flavour combinations and generally having a real laugh. Every day. That's not bad going is it? With Fanny watching over me. Every day. I don't think I've done anything deserving of a good belting. Yet.

I must distract Fanny's mind from leather. Fortunately Fanny has just the thing in mind for 'our' celebration - a three tired cake. Okay, so she's got her celebrations a little mixed up, but it's the thought that counts isn't it? She remembered! Her idea is to make a three tiered wedding cake, perfect for a June bride. She did love a good wedding, whether in June or not. She even had a fake one or two along the way, often more than one at the same time, and never really much clarity on who was married to whom, but we're not being judge-y today of all days, it's a day to celebrate.

Fanny suggests her tried and tested Christmas Cake (is it too early to mention?) for the three tiered triumph. We've made it before, together of course, but never in triplicate. Fanny informs us that the base layer is to be cut and eaten on the wedding day. The second layer should be stored away to celebrate the First Anniversary, or if we are more ambitious, and have blooming good storage, the Silver Wedding Anniversary. The Third and final tier is intended to celebrate the birth of the first child. I fear that Fanny may be waiting quite some time for that particular celebration. Maybe a sacrificial leathering is the best option after all.

So, it's a spicy, fruity, slightly boozy cake fest in June. Once all three cakes are mixed up and baked, Fanny urges us to move swiftly onto the decoration. Almond Paste followed by Royal Icing is essential as a starting point. She advises that it is best to practice decoration on an entirely irrelevant cake that you just happen to have lying around. This is what she makes Johnnie do. Poor Johnnie, it keeps him occupied. He decorates the bottom layer with stars. I, on the other hand, do not have any irrelevant cakes, or indeed any that hang about too long, but I am always applying the knowledge that wise old Fanny gives me. So I know cakes should be blue. Mix the two together and surely this is the ultimate Third Fanny-versary cake? The big question is, will we still be together for the next five years of Fanny Fun required to compete the Cookery Programme? Our next Fanny-versary is the much more suitable Fruit and Flowers, so don't be scared...

Would You Adam and Eve It?

Fashions for cookbooks continue to change all the time - whether it be the authors, the content or the design. Fanny herself devised an amazing array of over 40 cookbooks, and she rode every imaginable craze going.  She blooming well invented them too. The main direction she wanted us to go was backwards, of course not in our skills, in time. She wanted to 'bring back' good, old fashioned British cooking, with more than an 'Allo 'Allo to the French way of doing things. By that she meant mainly Victorian-style gastronomy, but more suited to the garish orange fabric of life for the modern housewife of the 60's and 70's who wasn't fortunate enough to have 'help'. So, everything had to be easy to achieve (which meant following Fanny to the letter), in super quick time (which was before your husband returned from work with his new boss for dinner) and without straining the  purse (which had taken rather a battering in recent years).

You see Fanny loved a pudding. Ye Olde ones mainly. She often called them Puddens. Savoury or sweet, mostly steamed but sometimes baked. Sometimes frozen or 'set'. All sorts of ingredients could be mixed up, transferred to one of the many pudding moulds from the dazzling display of designs that lined the kitchen shelves and simmered on the stove, or in a bain-marie in the oven, for a good few hours. Sometimes stodgy. Sometimes solid. Sometimes substantial. Always a filling, old-fashioned addition to any meal. Fanny wrote about them throughout all her cookbooks, and usually managed to slip in a pudding to her Bill of Fare, despite them slipping in and out of fashion.

I am delighted, as I'm sure Fanny would be too, that they may be coming back into vogue, thanks to a wonderfully glorious new cookbook just about to be released. I managed to snap up a sly copy ahead of release thanks to my local Waterstones being somewhat 'fluid' on dates and seemingly popping books on the shelves as they arrive in store. Naughty but nice. The wonderfully titled Pride and Pudding from Regula Ysewlin (Miss Foodwise if you please) is the most luxurious romp back through the centuries of puddings, savoury and sweet. Not only immaculately researched, but each recipe, in both original and updated form, is presented with a thoroughly ravishing set of photographs to boot. Regula is a talented photographer and graphic designer. Drool. The book is all wrapped together with a suitably elaborate and engaging design, thanks to Regula's husband and illustrator Bruno. Regula has Bruno. Fanny had Johnnie.

I can't take my eyes of the book, it's my current bedtime read. I'm not getting much sleep. I even started to leaf through the stunning pages while walking along the street heading home after excitedly, and sneakily it seems, buying it. This is the book Fanny wishes she could've written, telling the story not only of the British pudding, but also the cooks, writers and moments in history that helped to shape them. Many of them women. Fanny's all-time favourite Mrs A.B. Marshall features in the Ices and Jellies section. It had been Fanny's lifelong desire to reintroduce Mrs Marshall to the gastronomic world. Perhaps if Johnnie had been able to able to be more help than blethering on about booze she may have succeeded.

Fanny revives an Apple Pudding for us in the Easter partwork in the guise of Adam and Eve, mixing up her biblical references delightfully. It's a simple pudding made from breadcrumbs, moistened with milk, suet, sugar, lemon zest, raisins, egg and chopped apples added. I've used vegetable suet, naturally, and lovely Pink Lady Apples. Fanny doesn't specify. Mixed together and rammed into mini buttered moulds they simply steam for an hour or so, served still steaming away with a small dollop of cream. Fanny showcased them in her own very particular style back in the 1970's, already fading from fashion by then, but I love it. She would've been so very jealous of Pride and Pudding, but suitably proud and passionate too. I'm delighted to have both in my life - there is always room for pudding, whatever the fashion, whatever the mould and whatever the design. 

Going Dutch in the Oven

Sometimes Fanny Cradock makes suggestions that are widely applicable to a range of different situations. She'll say that such and such a cake is suitable for rustling up quickly perhaps when so and so just happen to pop round unexpectedly. Other menus are carefully crafted to stun the neighbours that you never really liked very much, convince uncertain bosses that promotion is the best option or to dazzle old chums on a heaving buffet table when entertaining. From time to time though she suggests something that's just so specific it's hard to imagine anyone thinking 'oh yes, that's just what I've been waiting for.' The final 'bread' in this partwork is just that - apparently it's simply perfect for when you are entertaining Dutch friends at Easter and are struggling to think what to serve them for breakfast. Always a dilemma.

The answer is Dutch Easterbread. or Oesterbröd. There can't really be many perfect choices for this situation. It's fortunate that Fanny herself happened to be in Amsterdam one Easter Sunday to taste this. Fanny doesn't disclose if any other traditional Dutch delicacies were taken on that particular trip. She does admit to having an 'overwhelming compulsion' to eat almond paste and crystallised fruits though, so was naturally drawn to this traditional Dutch bread which is filled with a fruity marzipan-y concoction. In Fannys mind, it would be too shameful to serve something from our own fair isle I imagine.

This recipe starts off with a standard batch of white bread dough. While it's proving, get to work whipping up some butter until it is 'creamily soft'. In Fanny's favourite kitchen implement, a roomy bowl, mix together ground almonds, icing sugar (sifted of course), glacé cherries (I've got some lovely retro-tastic multi-coloured ones), raisins and finely diced candied Angelica. It's all Fannys favourite things. Angelica has such an unusual taste, I love it. It's a favourite botanical in gin, which is probably why I love it so much! It's long overdue for a comeback in it's own right though I reckon. This nostalgic mix is bound together with an egg white to make a fairly firm paste.

Once proved, Fanny says to roll the dough out to a rectangular shape and spread it with the softened whipped butter. Fanny forms her fruity paste into a 'sausage' and rolls it up so that it's inside the dough. Fanny is very particular about the decoration, I'm guessing you wouldn't want your Easter breakfast guests from the Netherlands to be sniggering behind your back at your lack of authentic detail. So, I do as I am told and score the top of the loaf with 'slanty' cuts about 1/4 inch apart all the way down. A quick egg wash and a sprinkle with bashed up loaf sugar (or just ready bashed caster sugar) and it's ready to bake. Just 'until it's ready' - Fanny clearly thinks I'm now able to judge when this will be.

Having helped us to make several Cradock-style loaves now, Fanny is concerned about storage. She thinks it's vitally important, especially if you are new to the job. For busy women (and presumably men) there is 'no mortal use' in caring sufficiently about your families health (or perhaps your Dutch overnight guests) to create 'crusty crusts and an edible crumb with an absolute absence of artificial bleaching agents', unless the resulting beautiful loaves last several days. Fanny's recommendation is simple, once cooled wrap them tightly in ordinary kitchen foil. Then, even if your Dutch guests outstay their welcome and are still popping up for breakfast 2, 3, 4 or even 5 days after Easter, you will be serving them perfectly edible bread on each occasion. If you really want to see them 'rejoice' when they spy their breakfast tray, the trick is to serve this loaf not only with wheels of butter, but slices of cheese and ham rolled up. Oh, they'll be thrilled! Do let me know if you ever have guests from Holland over Easter and you try this. Or if like me, you don't, but simply love a massive slice of fruity, sweet almond bread.

Bier, Bundt und Butter

Fanny is decidedly determined to include a Deutchsland cake in her Christmas tea-time treats, in honour of Prince Albert, consort to Queen Victoria. Fanny says this is only right as 'they', being the Royals, the Germans, the Saxe Coburgs, 'brought Christmas to our Island' and without them we would have very different Christmas traditions. The Christmas Beer Cake, or Bierkuche, doesn't seem to have become a firm favourite for Brits, but we do seem to have adopted the entire month of Oktober to celebrate German ales so perhaps it is appropriate after all? It's another cake, or perhaps a sweet bread - she can't decide - which Fanny says improves with age, and yet again one which will have your waistline twitching in preparation for the winter ahead. Fanny insists its made in a ring shaped tin, for Germanic tradition presumably and not as an homage to Prince Alberts most famous piece of jewellery? Anything is possible with Fanny though, and she may have her tongue tucked firmly in her cheek with this one.

The flavours are full-on festive, packed with spice - cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves - all mixed in with a deep, dark German Ale. I'm using Erdinger Dunkel simply because I like it, but Fanny recommends using 'any old ale'. She mixes up her measurements for this one, using oz's for flour and butter and the more American-preferred 'cups' for the Black Treacle and Raisins. I'm working on the conversion of 1 cup to be 8 oz, so let's keep our fingers crossed! Fanny from time to time in other recipes specifies teacups, or breakfast cups, but for this one it's just 'cups'. 

This cake, or sweet bread, starts with the beer being gently heated with some butter and Black Treacle, quite a lot of treacle, until the butter melts. Off the heat, it's time to add the raisins and leave it to cool down to 'blood temperature' for all that lovely stuff to fatten up the fruit. Meanwhile the self-raising flour (remember Fanny never uses anything else!) is sifted with an incredible three teaspoons of baking powder, some salt and the spices. There are no eggs in this cake/bread at all, so presumably all that baking powder is required to lift it?

Fanny insists I butter and flour my Bundt in preparation of the mix. I tend not to use my Bundt tin all that much for fear of the cake getting stuck, but Fanny hasn't let me down so far. The chubby and now blood temperature raisin, beer, butter and treacle mix is folded into the sifted flour and spices with some chopped walnuts before transferring to the floured tin. No looking back. All that baking powder is making it rise up even before it goes into the oven. It bakes for a whopping 50 minutes, but does turn out fantastically well! Phew! The finished cake/bread or whatever it is tastes so wintery. Fanny says there is nothing else to do for the cold season than to cut yourself a huge fat wedge, slap some butter thickly on it, pour yourself a hearty foaming beer, sit back and put weight on. Who am I to disagree with Fanny? Winter waistline here I come - prost! 

I've entered this blogpost into #CookBlogShare hosted by the very lovely Lucy over at SuperGoldenBakes