F.A.Q.

Q:   What is this "fanbaking" you keep blathering about? 

A:   Gee, so glad you asked! Because if you're watching my stuff, chances are you'll see the word popping up a lot. Fanbaking is my personal take on making sweets, as well as the perfect excuse to whip my lazy butt into baking mode even when it isn't Xmas or Halloween or Easter, and none of my friends or colleagues is celebrating birthday/getting married/graduating/having a baby/throwing a party for the heck of it.


Q:   Would you care to elaborate ?

A:   As a child, I watched the protagonists of my fave anime series eat plenty of mysterious, exotic-looking treats. Oh, how enthralled I was! What could they taste like?
Nowadays I know the names of all those confections, and I have sampled most of them - but the burning curiosity is still there. It's only my focus that seems to have shifted: Wanna bet I could make that?

Also sometimes, while reading or watching TV, my brain wanders down some sort of weird synestesic route. Were I to bake a dessert for character X, what would it be?

To me, pretty much any trait can be traslated into flavour and vice-versa. Dark chocolate is smooth and sexy. The unexpected kick of hot spices suggests evil. Characters I hate are associated with ingredients I dislike. And so on... 





Q:   So, this has nothing to do with baking in a fan oven?

A:   Nope. Nothing at all. I call my nerdy approach "fanbaking" because I see it as a way to creatively express commitment to a fandom by means of my craft of choice, much as a figurative artist would draw fanart, or a writer would produce fanfiction. 
Plus, I am pretentious, and I want to see if I can push a silly neologism into common usage...

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Q:   You often say you don't eat/drink certain stuff because you're anosmic. What does it mean exactly? Is that your religious persuasion? (*)

A:   Anosmic means that I was born with no sense of smell, which of course impacts my eating habits heavily. I have no use for food that is more fragrant than flavourful (truffles, mushrooms in general, some spices.) I find wine unpalatable, and tea downright disgusting.

(*) Believe it or not, I have actually been asked this at a cake design seminar a couple years ago...


Q:   What, no sense of smell at all? Can you still taste flavours normally? 

A:   Yep, none at all. I was the kid who sat near the dunghill to eat her sandwiches during field trips, and couldn't understand why no one else was willing to join her. 
As for being able to perceive flavours normally, of course I couldn't say, since I've always been like this. I do taste things, but I guess my perception is blander and less nuanced than other people's - which gives me an higher-than-average  tolerance for "extreme" (sharp/fiery/sour) flavours. 


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Q:    Fave flavour?

A:   Mint - or, even better, mint/chocolate. It's my favourite flavour in the world! I am also very fond of ginger, cinnamon, and spices in general except anise. 
I am, as you might have gathered, something of a sweets person, but I do have quite a few fave savoury treats too. Cheese first and foremost, but also potatoes, and crusty white bread. 


Q:   Flavour you hate the most?

A:   Melon is probably the only food I can't stand at all - my kryptonite, if you will. Which is weird, because I love watermelon. Avocado is my other no-no, altough I have a slighly higher tolerance for it... I can stand the amount you'd get in your average sushi roll, for example, and won't spit avocado ice cream (won't love it either), whereas the slightest hint of melon, even as a candy or ice cream flavour, is enough to make me want to puke. 
Then there are a few things that gross me out, although I don't object to their taste per se. A few examples: entrails such as brain, tripe, kidney, and nerves (yet, weirdly enough, I'm fine with heart and liver), oysters and, for some reason, mascarpone cheese.