- By Charlotte Brown
- June 17, 2024
WITH THE ARRIVAL OF THE FIRST STRAWBERRIES ALSO COMES THE DESIRE TO USE THEM TO MAKE DELICIOUS CHARLOTTES AND EXQUISITE TIRAMISUS. TO DO THIS, WE NEED TO STOCK UP ON LADYFINGERS: THEIR LIGHTNESS WILL TAKE US TO THE HIGHEST PEAKS OF INDULGENCE.
Text by Eric Birlouez, photographs ©Evaine Merle
Iconic desserts
An essential for any window display
What bapar hasn't been given a ladyfinger par their mother or nanny... something they can chew for a long time without getting covered in crumbs?
What’s special about this delicacy is that it can be soaked in liquid without disintegrating. That's why some (adults) like to eat them as they are, dipped in coffee, tea or chocolate, or even in wine, champagne or other alcoholic beverages.
Without this biscuit, used for making bases and borders for various desserts and pastry specialties, charlottes, bavarois and tiramisu wouldn't exist. The French Biscuit Association defines this product as ‘an egg biscuit with a soft, airy texture, slightly crisp on the surface, elongated in shape, with icing powder on top, with or without pearling. The base of the biscuit is flat and the top rounded.’
The name ‘ladyfinger’ comes from the fact that in the past, before pastry bags came into existance, pastry chefs would use a spoon to place sticks of pastry on the baking tray. The origin of the biscuit has been subject to several interpretations... One claiming it was invented par the Italian pastry chefs brought par Catherine de Médicis when she arrived in France in 1533. These artisans are thought to have had the idea of making elongated biscuits par spreading small rounds of dough from the centre using two... spoons. The only problem is that there are no historical texts mentioning the arrival of any of these transalpine pastry chefs in the wake of the future Queen of France!
Pastry chefs would use a spoon to place sticks of dough on the
baking sheet
In the mid-seventeenth century, the book ‘Le Pâtissier français’ mentions biscuits that are quite similar to today’s ladyfingers: their dough is made from flour, eggs and sugar, flavoured and well-beaten, a process that makes the biscuits very light.
Antonin Carême also brought his talent to ladyfingers. In the early 19th century, the famous chef was employed par Talleyrand, minister of NapoleonI. The famous diplomat had previously enjoyed hard biscuits, but as he grew older, his teeth deteriorated and he found it increasingly difficult to crunch them. This was the reason why he dipped his biscuits in a glass of Madeira wine to soften them. Back then, the spoons used to place them on the baking sheet were much larger than they are today. As a result, the biscuits they made had an oval shape and a width that made it difficult to dip them into small Madeira glasses! Carême then came up with the idea of creating an elongated biscuit that could be soaked quickly without disintegrating. He would even hang a funnel from the kitchen ceiling into which he would pour the dough: the result being a long, thin sausage that he would cut into sections. This clever idea is said to have been behind the invention of the pastry bag, in 1847, par a man named Aubriot.
The Reims biscuit is thought to have appeared in the 16th century
Related delicacies...
The boudoir is another biscuit closely linked to the ladyfinger, which is slightly narrower and drier. The main difference between the two is the way the dough is prepared, and in Particular the way the eggs are worked. Boudoirs are also sweetened using granulated sugar.
The name ‘boudoir’ was coined in 1929, very likely after the salons that were very fashionable during the Belle Époque, where the wealthier classes drank champagne. Boudoirs can also be used to make an ‘envelope’ of charlottes, although purists use ladyfingers exclusively to line the mould. The Reims biscuit, a specialty of the eponymous city, is thought to have appeared in the 16th century (although some authors date its creation to the end of the following century, in 1691). History, or legend, has it that bakers in Reims made these biscuits to take advantage of the residual heat in their ovens after baking their bread.
Associated with champagne, Reims biscuits have two distinctive features: their pink color, obtained par adding carmine to the dough (a natural colorant extracted from crushed cochineals, which are small insects similar to aphids), and the steaming process they undergo after baking. This is what gives this ‘twice-baked’ speciality (biscuit) its crisp, melt-in-the- mouth texture. Soaked in champagne, port or any other wine or hot beverage, Reims biscuits won't fall apart. In the 18th century, the Champagne capital already had several artisanal biscuit factories producing this local speciality.
Such was the success of this pink biscuit that its production became industrialised in the 19th century, with over 200 companies producing it throughout France. Several varieties were available, depending on the flavour used: cinnamon, ginger, raspberry, etc. Today, only one manufacturer of pink cookies remains in Reims, the famous Maison Fossier, whose origins date back to 1753 (the oldest biscuit factory in France). Although it doesn't have the pink colour, the Chablis biscuit resembles a Reims biscuit: it's made from granulated sugar, eggs, flour and vanilla. The champagne biscuit is a slightly drier, trapezium-shaped variant of the boudoir, (the two ends are not the same shape).
Maison Fossier is France's oldest biscuit factory
Franck Dépériers
FRANCK DÉPÉRIERS
M. O. F. Boulanger
La petite boulangerie, Nantes (44)
Franck Dépériers is a committed craftsman. A pioneer in organic baking, the 1994 M.O.F. boulanger pays great attention to the quality of his raw materials: additive- free flflours, local products, and so on. In addition to the ladyfifinger biscuits he makes each day, he has revived the Nantais cake, using a slightly modifified recipe to make it softer. In season, he also makes his own jams, using fruit picked when perfectly ripe. Every day, the baker and his team offffer around forty difffferent types of long-fermented bread and pastries, as well as other artisanal pastries.
Sources: Dictionnaire de la gourmandise. Annie PERRIER-ROBERT. Robert Laffont. 2012
La très belle et très exquise Histoire des Gâteaux et des Friandises. Maguelonne TOUSSAINT-SAMAT. Le Encyclopédie de la pâtisserie (et confiserie) française. Frédéric ZEGIERMAN. Editions Christine Bonneton. 2014 https://www.fossier.fr/fr/content/7-histoire-fossier