I was in the kitchen this weekend making hamantaschen and it, as well as the upcoming Purim holiday, put to mind the Austrian Jewish specialty Fächertorte. A cousin of the Hungarian Jewish dessert flódni, with its layers of poppy seed, apple, walnut, and plum jam (flavours often found in the center of a hamantasch, hence the connection), in his novel Die Tante Jolesch, Friedrich Torberg speaks of Fächertorte as being of either Polish or Czech origin, and notes that, during the interwar period about which he wrote, the more levels the Fächertorte had, the more elaborate it was considered, and therefore the better the finished torte undoubtedly was. For more on the history of Fächertorte, I suggest reading a feature that ran in Tablet last year, which, well, I wrote.
As part of the research for that piece, I got to go behind the scenes at Demel, one of the city's premiere patisseries, former purveyors to the royal family, and one of the two homes of the Sachertorte (more on that to come, I'm sure). Demel is the last place in Vienna still producing the Fächertorte, sadly, and herewith, some photographs (which weren't used in my feature) showing how they make it:
To begin, the floor and sides of a large cake tin are lined with a thick layer of pastry substantial to hold what is to follow.
The first layer is one and a half pounds of poppy seeds, cooked with milk and sugar to form a thick paste.
Next comes one and a half pounds of honey-flavoured walnut filling.
The third layer is two pounds of apples, sliced and cooked for around 45 minutes with sugar and cinnamon until tender. The final flourish consists of two concentric circles of plum jam.
Now the tortes have to be topped with a final round of pastry, crimped with a fork, poked with holes to allow the steam to escape, baked for one and a half hours, and cooled completely before being removed from its mould.
