The old ways

Consider the Fork

I've finally made my way through the pile of Christmas books to this much-awaited one: Consider the Fork: A History of How We Cook and Eat by Bee Wilson. I've only just begun to read it, but already it's doing what I expected it to - it's made me see cooking (and baking) in a whole new light. Plenty of 'Oh I see!' and 'Gosh, really?' moments. Partly a walk through the history of gadgets in the kitchen (i.e. everything from the humble wooden spoon to sophisticated electronic mixers and the like) and partly an explanation of why we do what we do. Why is stir-frying food in a wok the culinary norm in China for example? Apparently it was originally devised as a very fast way of cooking food in areas where there was a scarcity of fire-wood (You're having a 'Gosh, really?' moment aren't you?). As so often happens, a particular manner of cooking became tradition and remained in place long after the original impetus had disappeared. 

Nanny C's mixing bowl with last year's Christmas Pud

Being both curious baker and nerdy archaeologist, this book draws me in on both counts (there's a good deal of delving into the past here). One comment that Wilson makes about cooks being inherently conservative struck a nerve (it is, of course, true and helps explain why so many traditions live on in the kitchen). I don't tend to think of myself as conservative though and had never thought too hard about my own habits in the kitchen - many of which are so deeply ingrained that I barely even consider why I do things a certain way. Why, for instance, do I always use my Grandmother's old baking bowl, which I inherited, to mix both Christmas puddings and cakes? I have other bowls big enough, yet I always find myself reaching for the lovely cream-coloured ceramic bowl. Admittedly, it is very pleasing to the eye (I'm a sucker for all things pretty), but it's also more fragile than a modern plastic bowl (I'm a terrible klutz). Being forced to consider the bowl (to borrow a phrase), I've just now realised that it's the twin of the one Mam always used and in which I would help to stir the mixtures every year as a small child. Perhaps this is less a case of conservatism, however, and more an example of kitchen nostalgia.

There have been times when I've had to pry myself away from doing things a certain way and grudgingly admit that, yes, there might well be a newer, easier or better approach (not just conservative but stubborn too - to add to the littany of my faults being catalogued in this blog-post). Take pastry-making: I always knew to add lemon juice to the water I was using to combine my pastry dough, because that's how I learned to do it from my mother. It wasn't until I began to read books about baking as an adult that I understood the science behind it (the acidity in the lemon juice helps to relax the gluten formed by mixing the flour and water, keeping the pastry nice and flaky). Naturally, I kept using lemon juice, much like I kept rubbing in the butter by hand, for many a year to come until finally, one Christmas about six years ago I tried a different method. I was making an awful lot of pastry that year, in preparation for my annual mince-pie and mulled wine party, at which I served not just mince-pies but also sausage rolls. Hungry mouths made hungrier by glasses of mulled wine required numerous trays of both pies and rolls. 

Pastry inspiration in Patisserie 

Hands cramping as I rubbed butter into the first three pounds of pastry dough (I kid you not), I went to my bookcase and searched through my cookbooks. Nigella (who had never let me down in the past) had a recipe for shortcrust pastry that involved an electric processor (controversial) and orange juice (not lemon?). With a mental shrug and without much wringing of my already sore hands, I decided to do a trial batch. To make a long story short, once you keep strictly to the 'everything must be as cold as possible' mantra, it works. And although I agree with my mother that you really can't beat the tender crumb and flaky nature of a shortcrust made by hand, it does produce a very good substitute. Sometimes the old ways really are the best, but when time or sore hands get the better of you, I've learned not to sniff at a new approach. I'm sure there were bakers who were once equally sniffy about the advent of the electric mixer (my most prized possession), and clung furiously to their wooden spoons and hand-whisks (more fool them I say). 

In the spirit of trying something new but also honouring the methods of the past (i.e. indulging in a spot of comfy conservatism), I'm determined to try a recipe from one of my new baking books (Patisserie by Murielle Valette). In a rather ambitious move, I'm going to try my hand at making one of my favourite things to eat with a cup of coffee - the fabulous almond croissant. It's something that I've never done before, which is understandable given the time it takes to prepare the croissant dough and make the pastries (hence the 'ambitious' - set aside at least two days, with lots of folding, resting and proving involved). This is one instance in which the old ways are not only the best way, but also pretty much the only way - short of buying them from a very good artisan bakery, there's no quick-dash ninja route to a delicious croissant (I'm going to be stern here people - supermarket / petrol station / corner shop ones do not count). I've had a longing for one since before Christmas and not having a wonderful French boulangerie on my doorstep (sigh), I think it's time to give it a go. No promises on when this will happen (my packed schedule this week and other baking commitments at the weekend suggest that I will have to employ the delayed gratification technique and make myself wait), but rest assured that as soon as I get the first batch out of the oven, you'll be the first to know.

Out of the closet

I've just watched the first episode of the new, fourth series of The Great British Bake Off. As a rule I don't watch reality TV - not because I'm taking the moral high ground but just because I find it awfully boring - so this is pretty much the only reality show I watch. I didn't even tune in for the first series, as I assumed it was more of the same - catty judges, annoying presenters, cringe-inducing contestants, bitter competition and a set-up

Chocolate fudge cake

designed to constantly ratchet up the tension level. Then one day while channel-hopping, I stopped on what turned out to be episode 2 of the second series. Before I knew it, I was hooked. The presenters, Mel and Sue, are both lovely and also funny (without being annoying and too try-hard). The judges are the wonderful Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood (while Mr Hollywood is ostensibly the 'baddie', he's actually quite fair). All in all, it's a big ol' baking love-in. The contestants love baking, everyone involved loves cake and while things can get a bit tense, the general feeling is one of friendly competition rather than a fight to win at all costs. (If you ask me, I think it's all the cake being eaten - the sweet stuff neutralises any potential nastiness).

The popularity of the show over the last few years has grown immeasurably and has coincided with a rise in the popularity of baking. The fact that more people are baking at home may have something to do with the recession - less money, more time perhaps, though it's also true that when life gets tough, we often seek comfort in the familiar and certain tastes can evoke memories of happier times. Whether or not it caused the renewed interest in baking, The Great British Bake Off has most definitely sustained it and caused it to spread like wild fire. As recently as two years ago, I had to source most of my cake decorating supplies online from the UK. Now, there are new shops popping up all over Dublin and even my local Home Store + More has carved out a substantial section of the shop especially for baking and decorating apparatus. 

Now don't get me wrong, I think it's brilliant that more people are willing to give baking a go (more lovely cake to go round), but I'm finding it a bit strange that baking is suddenly 'cool'. As someone who has always baked, I can tell you that there was nothing cool about admitting to your teenage peers that you had spent the weekend baking buns and making a really yummy Scandinavian Apple Charlotte for dessert. Back in the late 80s, it didn't have quite the same cachet as say, going to a disco / sneaking into a bar / hanging out with boys. So I maintained a closeted baking existence, revealing my strange predilection for cake-making only to close friends and family. Things didn't improve terribly in the early 90s, but I didn't notice as I was too busy with college, living abroad and generally having a good time, to do much baking anyway. By the early noughties, I was baking regularly once more and even, occasionally, outing myself to work colleagues - some left-over chocolate and peanut-butter cookies here, a few slices of gingerbread there. Finally, circa 2005, I made and brought in a whole chocolate fudge cake to work, to celebrate the birthday of a colleague who is also a very good friend of mine. There was no escaping it, I was now firmly out of the closet (or should that be out of the baking press?) and I have never looked back. So I'm out and I'm proud - my name is Clare and I love baking. 

Baking mishaps and cake disasters

Chocolate Fudge Cake

I've always thought that everyone should know how to bake, or at the very least, should give it a go (and the gratuitous photos of yummy cakes posted here today are to encourage you to pick up that whisk). It's such a rewarding activity and, unless you're a contestant on Masterchef or taking part in the horrifying Come Dine With Me, there's really no need to make anything complicated or to find yourself all stressed out. In fact, that's one of the great joys of baking. No matter what you decide to bake, whether it's a simple scone or a decadent chocolate layer cake, you will feel just as happy with the end result. Your kitchen will smell fabulous as it bakes and once it has emerged from the oven and cooled sufficiently, there's the satisfaction of eating something you made yourself. Not to mention, of course, that the taste of a home-made cake is second to none.

So many people I speak to are either terrified of or overwhelmed by the thought of baking, convinced that making a cake successfully from scratch requires great skill, natural talent and possibly even an element of magic. Really all you need are some basic techniques (easily learned and mastered with practice) and a good recipe that you promise to follow to the letter. Unlike savoury cooking - which can be quite forgiving if you leave something out, get your quantities wrong or cook it for too long - baking is an exact science. As such, you must follow the recipe, using the exact ingredients listed, in the amounts given and the method prescribed and, as a rule, the result will be a lovely cake. With enough experience and knowledge it is possible to alter recipes and adjust ingredients, but for a novice or for the nervous, just following the recipe should get you there.

Coffee & Walnut Cake

For those of you gnashing your teeth as you read this, thinking 'But I did and it still didn't work!', I will admit that some recipes are more foolproof than others. Bad copy editing has a lot to answer for, though sometimes, the problem is that the author assumes a certain level of knowledge or experience on the part of the reader or they just don't think to spell out every step in the process. One American book I bought was a nightmare, riddled with errors - I tried twice to bake the 'Hot Milk Sponge Cake' and was left with a sadly droopy sponge each time. A spot of googling revealed that it wasn't just me - other bakers had tried and failed this and other recipes from the book (it's called 'Miette' - don't be fooled by its very pretty cover and design, it will lead you astray).

So don't despair, it may not be your fault that your cake didn't turn out right. Find a reliable recipe and give baking another go! If I had to recommend somewhere to begin, I would point you towards Delia Smith or Mary Berry. Nigella's recipes are always fabulous and have never let me down but according to Sister No.3 (who bakes less than the rest of us), they can be a little slap-dash in the instruction department. That being said, even with the most reliable, tried-and-tested recipe and years of experience, cake disasters do occur. Lest you think that there are no cake skeletons hiding in my closet, here are some I made earlier...

There was the time I forgot to put the flour in the chocolate and peanut-butter cookies - flour is a crucial binding ingredient, giving cakes and biscuits structure, so it's no surprise that the result was a molten mess of butter, sugar, peanut-butter and chocolate on the tray when it came out of the oven. Another time, I added the bicarbonate of soda (a common raising agent for cakes) to the warm wet mixture of a Chocolate Christmas Cake, when it should have been in with the dry ingredients. It bubbled and fizzed furiously, using up all of its lovely rising power in advance of the baking. I ignored my instincts and baked it anyway - needless to say, the cake came out about half the height it should have been and was as dense as brick. All of those lovely (and expensive!) ingredients wasted. Sister No.1 had a similar experience recently when making her famous Coconut Cake for a family event with her in-laws. She completely forgot the baking powder (another raising agent), resulting in two solid discs of sponge sandwiched with some rather delicious cream cheese icing and covered in coconut. Her cake still made it to first place at the informal cake contest held that day by her brother-in-law and was totally savaged (it just goes to show, one person's cake disaster can be another person's tasty treat).

I find these mishaps rarely occur when I'm trying something new or complex, but instead when I'm tired, distracted and making something I've done a dozen times before. Maybe there should be a caveat included in any baking instructions - do not attempt while tired and avoid if you've been enjoying a tipple. Ultimately, experienced baker or scared beginner, things can and do go wrong, so the best thing to do is adopt a relaxed attitude and, most importantly, don't panic - it's only cake!