It was hard for Fran Baronin to take her children to the country and leave Herr Baton in his lonely JiiiiggesilL'iiwobtuitog, his bachelor quarters, in Vienna, since they were all quite unused to being separated. Golf and commutation never came between Viennese couples, and the city was so small that most gentlemen could walk home from their offices for lunch and a nap each day. Husbands accompanied their wives to help select hats and gowns, and wives accompanied husbands when they went skiing and shooting.
However annoying these summer separations might be, they did have their pleasant little compensations. Herr Baron was forced to write his wife some of his amusing letters—the accepted Viennese combination of news, endearments, cultured quotations from Goethe and Schiller, and some risqué anecdotes, always written in French or English so that the servants and children wouldn't be shocked. No servant or child ever read any of the letters, which Fran Baronin kept locked away in a beautiful old glove box, but the possibility that they might provided a good excuse for a little trilingual showing-off. The summer separation forced Herr Baron to make love to Frau Baronin by long distance, and he used his imagination and the services of countless sympathetic assistants to help him arrange diverting little reminders for her. Having stayed behind in Vienna to work, he spent half his time contriving surprises and romantic messages for his vacationing wife and children.
He engaged a trio of musicians to sing her a Stäandchen one lovely summer evening. The fact that she was shampooing her hair when they gathered under her window did not at all detract from the charm of the message; she found that she could lean on the window sill and comb her hair to the strains of Schubert's “Näne des Geliebten,” “An Sylvia,” and all the other favorite love-songs Herr Baron had specified. When the musicians finally went down the hill. Frau Baronin thought she heard a very faint echo of the “Lorelei” from the valley below. On another occasion, Herr Baron had somehow managed to find an itinerant Italian organ-grinder, with a red-coated monkey, who came to play for the children. He ground through his entire repertoire while the little monkey extended his cap and collected every penny the children had saved. Whenever Frau Baronin looked out her window and saw anyone pushing a bicycle, or riding up the long dusty lull with a while parcel or a bunch of flowers, she knew Herr Baron was courting her from Vienna. The parcels usually meant something to ear.
The second compensation for the separation was a wild, wonderful, extravagant fling with all her favorite desserts and bakeries. Frau Baronin controlled herself only until she had attended to her social duties. She had brought along a soft, expensive, imported girdle—the sort of thing that could come only from Amerika—one high-necked, long-sleeved summer dress, white gloves, and a very becoming (lowered hat. This costume she wore as soon as possible after her arrival, when she took the children to call on her aunt at the Kaiser Villa. The children were always ill before and after the call, but managed to conduct themselves properly through the minor royal Jause, a kind of high tea. When the visit was out of the way, the girdle was discarded, the dress was hung away, and dirndls became the summer uniform. The laced bodices, full skirts, and gay aprons were so adaptable that all the extra Krapfen and Kugeln that would be eaten during the summer needn't show at all. Summer resort pastry needed room for expansion.
Anyone traveling in Europe could easily see where the Viennese spent their summers. Whether their homes were near Ischl or Salzburg, beyond the Semmering or across the Italian border in Meran, there they would find the Filialen of Vienna's renowned shops. A Filiale, as the word implies, is an offshoot of an established institution. A summer resort Filiale was the offspring of a shop that the Viennese considered essential, so essential, in fact, that the shopkeeper very wisely opened these little branches to accommodate his clientele in summer, That was the time when they needed him the most; they wouldn't have known how to get along without him. A Viennese lady could deal with many of her accustomed merchants in the summer, and, above all, she could eat all her beloved pastries and Torten at the Filiate of her Viennese confectioner. A change to another Konditorei would have entailed weeks of trials before Frau Baronin and her children would even have known which Torte they liked best.
Frau Baronin went every day to the Filiate of her favorite confectioner to eat all the Rollen and the Schnitten, the Kugeln and the T'orten that she had partially resisted during the winter in Vienna. The policy of the Filiate was a specialty each day, a different 'Yurie or Schnille, as well as the classic Sticker, Linzer, and Dobos Torten which remained in constant demand and were never permanently superseded by any new inventions. The Filiate offered freshly baked plain cakes and smaller pastries each day, but the chief attraction—the day's specialty—made the long walk or drive into town very exciting. The children conjectured and Fran Baronin hoped, and often hinted, for her favorites. When there was going to be a pink Punschtorte or a green and pink Fürst Pucklet Torte, Frau Baronin took the children in the opposite direction. not down into the valley, but up into the mountains to the Molkerei, the dair) shop. There they sat in a white-fenced garden in front of the tiny white Molkerei, with red geraniums in the window boxes, and ate less elaborate fare from red-and-white checkered table covers. A perfect lazy day with lazy cows grazing all around them and all the delicacies of the mountain dairy at their disposal. There were cold buttermilk, clotted cream—“Dicke Milcb”—little creamy cheeses, and great round loaves of black peasant bread. They could order the sweetest butter, large flat cheesecakes made with raisins and almonds, sweet milk, and fruit tarts with cheese pastry. The children played with the milker's children and Frau Baronin sat in the sun. First she had a glass of cold milk with a slice of buttered black bread; later she had Quark-kuchen with raisins and a little clotted cream with fruit. Finally they took the long walk down the mountain path in the setting sun.
When the Filiate planned a Kaisertorte as the specialty of the day, Frau Baronin forewent her Mittagessen so that there would be the maximum amount of room for this maximum pleasure. The shopkeeper, knowing her preferences, always bid in an extra Toste. Frau Baron in ate slowly and with gusto; she enjoyed every single bite and always ate until she felt that she had truly had her fill until next summer. When she returned home, she found six of the village children with flowers wreathed around their heads and bouquets in their hands. They had come to present her with a Kaisertorte from Herr Baron.
Toward the end of her visit, the Filiate manager, who had known her since she was a child, prepared to bake all her favorite pastries as an adieu for the season. By this time Fran Baronin knew that there were no long mirrors at the Scbloss and that they had never ordered any scales. She suspected the worst, five kilos, maybe even eight, but all that would come off after the month of Karlsbad rigors which lay ahead. It was necessary to fortify oneself with a layer of far on which to live during the diet. After all, how could Frail Baronin lose weight if there was no weight to lose?
On the way home from the last afternoon at the Filiate, the family passed all the peasant women knitting as they sat beside their great baskets of tempting fruit, arranged in white paper cornucopias. Frau Baronin stained her teeth eating glossy black cherries as large as plums. She took home greengages for a Frucbttorte and gooseberries for a tart. On the hill, walking home, she overtook a man loaded down with a suspicious, bulky white parcel; what could Herr Baron be up to now? She helped carry it, only to discover an enormous porcelain terrine of goose liver. Herr Baron wanted his love to ear it with green grapes, for she had just sent to him, by special messenger, green grapes from their arbors to eat with his goose liver in Vienna. It was to be the last spree and the last ounce for each of them. They would probably drive to Karlsbad with their open belts hidden under loose dusters and their vision of each other dimmed by black goggles.
A telegram from Herr Baron announced his arrival next day. He would be fescb, dashing, even if a little heavier—fresh from Herr Ober and his solicitations. They had compensated for their loneliness with wonderful food, but now that (hey were about to starve, they would do it hand in hand.
Kaisertorte
Grind 1 cup blanched almonds and pound them in a mortar to a smooth paste. Work in 1 ¼ cup sugar, 3 tablespoons brandy, 1 teaspoon almond extract, and 3 unbeaten egg whites, one at a time. Fold in 3 stiffly beaten egg whiles and 1 tablespoon flour. The mixture should be moist enough to pipe easily, but it should not run. Draw a 12-inch circle on a piece of brown paper, pipe the batter through a pastry tube evenly onto the circle, and bake the macaroon in a very slow oven (250°F.) for 30 minutes. Strip the paper from the macaroon and let the cake-cool. Moisten the paper, if necessary, to facilitate stripping it off.
Beat 3 egg yolks with 2/3 cup sugar until light and foamy, and add ¾ cup almonds, blanched and ground, 1 teaspoon grated lemon rind, and the juice of 1 lemon. Heat 3 egg whites very stiff and fold them with ¾ cup sifted cake Hour into the egg yolk mixture.
Pour the batter into a buttered 10-inch spring-form pan and bake the cake in a moderately hot oven (375° F.) for 25 minutes, or until it tests done. Cool the cake and split it in half. Spread the macaroon with thick seedless raspberry jam and cover the jam with one of the cake halves. Spread it with more jam and top with the second cake layer. Frost the cake with lemon fondant icing, tinted, if desired, with a few drops of yellow vegetable coloring. Pipe large rosettes of vanilla butter cream on the macaroon border and on the edge of the cake, and dust the rosettes on the border with ½ cup powdered sweet chocolate.
Lemon Fondant Icing
Heat 1 ½ cups fondant (January, 1958) in the top of a double boiler over gently boiling water. Do not allow the upper section of the double-boiler to touch the water, as the fondant must be melted over steam. As soon as the fondant has reached spreading consistency, about 100° F. on a candy thermometer, color it pale yellow with a few drops of yellow food coloring and add 2 tablespoons lemon juice. Pour the fondant onto the Torre and spread it quickly by tilting the Torte. If the fondant becomes too stiff to spread, it can be reheated.
Vanilla Butter Cream
Boil 1 cup sugar with 2/3 cup water until the syrup spins a thread. Pour the syrup onto A well-beaten egg yolks, bearing constantly until the mixture is cold. Cream 1 1/3 cups butter and beat it into the yolks with 2 teaspoons vanilla. Do not overheat, as the butter will separate.
Rum Rosinenkrapfen {Rum Raisin Fritters)
Cut 1 cup butter into 4 cups flour until the mixture resembles rough sand. Dissolve ¼ teaspoon salt in ¾ cup ice water and add to the flour-butter mixture as much of the liquid as necessary to make a firm dough. Let the dough rest in a cool place overnight.
Chop ½ cup raisins, pour enough rum over them to cover, and marinate them until they are soft. Chop 1 cup walnuts, or ½ cup each of walnuts and hazelnuts, and add to them 1 cup sugar, ½ cup dried macaroon or biscuit crumbs, and the raisins. Moisten this filling with just enough rum to bind.
Roll out the dough and, with a cookie cutler, cut it into 4-inch rounds. Place about 1 ½ tablespoons of the filling in the center of each round. Paint the edges with egg yolk, fold the rounds, and press the edges together very firmly.
Fry the Krapfen. a few at a rime, in deep hot fat (375° F.) until they are golden, let them cool, and dust them with powdered sugar. Makes about 24 Krapfen.
Kirchkuchen (Cherry Cake)
Stir together 1 cup each of softened butter and sugar, and 5 or 6 egg yolks. depending on their size. Add ¾ cup ground almonds, 6 pieces of stale bread, soaked in milk and pressed dry, 2 pounds stemmed black cherries, 2 tablespoons kirsch, 4 tablespoons heavy cream, and ¼ teaspoon cinnamon. Fold in 5 or 6 stiffly beaten egg whiles. If the batter is too moist, add another slice of stale bread. Pour the batter into a buttered spring-form pan and bake it in a moderate oven (350° F.) for 1 to 1 ¼ hours, or until an inserted straw comes out clean. Dust the Kirscbkuchen with sugar and cool it.
Sylviarollen (Almond Rolls)
Grind ¾ cup blanched almonds, add 1/3 cup sugar and 2 tablespoons flour, and carefully fold in 4 egg whites beaten stiff with 2 tablespoons sugar. Butter and flour a baking sheet and spread the batter thinly in 4-inch squares, using a stiff paper stencil if desired. Leave enough space between (he squares to allow for spreading. Dust a 1-inch strip of finely shaved-blanched almonds down the center of each square and bake the squares in a slow oven (300° F.) for 5 to 6 minutes, or until the edges are lightly browned . Roll each square at once over a wooden stick to form a hollow tube 4 inches long by about ¾ inch in diameter, and lightly press the seam. Do not attempt to bake more than 6 squares at once, and, if they become too brittle to handle, return them to the oven to soften.
Pipe each tube half full of mocha butter cream and fill the other half with chocolate butter cream, to which pistachio nuts may be added.
Mocha Butler Cream
Follow the directions for vanilla butter cream, substituting 2 tablespoons coffee essence for the vanilla.
Chocolate Butter Cream
Follow the directions for vanilla butter cream, substituting 2 ounces sweet chocolate, melted, for the vanilla.
Quarkkuchen (Cheesecake)
Sift 2 ½ cups flour onto a pastry board, make a well in the center, and into it put ½ cup sugar, 1 cup softened butter, 2 egg yolks, and 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind. Quickly work the center ingredients into the Hour to make a smooth dough, adding a little more flour, if necessary, to facilitate handling. On a lightly floured pastry board roll out the dough to make a rectangle about 11 by 17 inches. Line a baking sheet with the dough and bake it in a moderate oven (350° F.) for about 15 minutes, until it is half done. Let the pastry shell cool.
To 1 ½ cups sieved cottage cheese add 4 egg yolks and 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind. Beat 4 egg whites very stiff, gradually adding ½ Cup sugar when they have slightly stiffened. Fold the beaten egg whites and 2 tablespoons flour into the cheese mixture and spread the cooled pastry shell with the cheese filling. Sprinkle the cake with ½ cup each of raisins and slivered blanched almonds, and press the topping lightly into the filling. Bake the Quarkkucben in a very slow oven (275° F.) for about 45 minutes, let it cool, and cut it into large squares.
Praline Kugln (Praline Cakes)
Make a macaroon batter as for Kaiserforte, but bake the batter in 18 small rounds instead of 1 large one.
Beat 4 egg yolks with 1/3 cup sugar until light and foamy. Beat 6 egg whites stiff, gradually adding ¼ cup sugar.
Carefully fold the egg whites with 1 cup sifted flour into the yolks. Pour the batter into 18 small muffin tins, and bake the cakes in a moderate oven (350° F.) for 20 minutes, or until they test done. While the cakes are warm, hollow out the top of each with a spoon, let them cool, and fill each hollow with 1 brandied cherry and as much praline butter cream as possible. Invert the cakes onto the macaroon bases and press them down firmly. Spread the top and sides of each cake with enough praline butter cream to conceal the macaroon base and sprinkle the little cakes with coarsely chopped praline powder.
Praline Powder
In a copper pan combine ½ cup each of unblanched whole almonds, hazelnuts. and water, 1 ½ cups sugar, and ½ teaspoon cream of tartar. Stir the mixture over low heat until the sugar is dissolved and continue cooking, without stirring, until the syrup turns golden. Pour the mixture at once onto a lightly oiled baking sheet or marble slab and let it cool. When it is cold, crush it with a rolling pin, retaining some coarsely broken praline for the outside of the Kugeln and rolling the rest to a fine powder for mixing with the butter cream.
Praline Butter Cream
Follow the directions for vanilla butter cream, substituting 2 tablespoons coffee essence for the vanilla and adding ¾ cup praline powder after the butter cream is beaten.