Gran’s Comforting Coffee Cake

Meg tasted a teaspoonful of her latest attempt at what was supposed to be her Gran’s Comforting Coffee Cake, and waited. 

In less than a minute a worm of unease began to twist in her gut, and her heart rate began to climb.

“Uh!” Meg took a gulp of the lukewarm peppermint tea she had standing by for just such an outcome, and followed it with a deep, steadying breath. 

Wrong again!

After another few rounds of sip, deep breath, sip, deep breath, she picked up the still-warm cake tin in both hands, and upended it straight into the bin. 

The first four tries had gone into the back garden to feed the crows, but those had been benign, ordinary coffee cakes. The discomforting effect of this version had been potent, and Meg didn’t want to inflict that on the poor birds.

Meg failed to celebrate the achievement in getting any effect at all, because it was exactly the wrong one. It was supposed to be a comforting cake!

She scrubbed the cake tin with gritted teeth and dumped it dripping onto the drainer. Then she picked up the half empty mug and dropped into the threadbare couch.

 The couch had been her Gran’s, as was the mug that held Meg’s tea, as was every book, dish, knick-knack, and piece of furniture that Meg could see stuffed into the main room of her Gran’s little cottage by the woods.

Meg stared into the kitchen, and wondered if it was too late to move back to the city, take up that internship her friend Annie had got for both of them after they graduated. At least there she would’ve had someone to ask for the answers, or at least company to figure it all out with.

From the couch, Meg could still see the recipe though, written in Gran’s own hand on stained and yellowed paper. Meg had first sealed it in a plastic sleeve to keep it safe, then taped to the wall for ease of reference.

The trouble was, Gran had only ever written down the ingredients and the steps; the usual whisk this, fold those, bake on 375 degrees for 30 minutes or until golden-brown on top. She hadn’t written down the important bits.

Meg had even baked the cake with her Gran, many many times when her father had dropped her off at the cottage for weekends and school holidays. She had spent those days learning all sorts of things from her Gran, and practicing the Family Secrets, as Gran referred to her particular recipes, usually with a wink. 

Most of all, Meg remembered the effect the cake was supposed to have, like a warm blanket and a mug of tea in a thunderstorm, like her mother’s hugs when she had been upset. Like staying at Gran’s, and baking together.

And then Meg had gone off to university with her high school friends to get a career, and spent holidays travelling abroad to collect experiences, because that’s what you did, and she had always meant to come to visit the little cottage at the edge of the woods and bake with Gran from time to time.

But she hadn’t, and Gran had died. 

Meg’s father had waited til she finished university to tell her that Gran had left the cottage to her, and there was no mention of the responsibility that went with it. He hadn’t even suggested that it would be either-or taking up her Gran’s mantle or following the career path she had modelled after her friends’ choices. 

Meg took another long gulp of the peppermint tea. She couldn’t tell if the pit in her stomach was a lingering effect of the ill-made cake or the downside to that same flutter she had felt when her father had told her, and Meg had to choose, and when she had realised, suddenly, which path she would take.

The tea helped, and Meg closed her eyes and calmed herself further by mentally compiling the list of ingredients she would need to restock before another attempt. Can I fit in a trip to the market this afternoon? I’ll need to head into the woods first thing in the morning. 

Now that Meg had distracted herself with practicalities, the thought that had been waiting for just such a moment caught her attention.

Hang on...

She had gotten an effect, though it was the exact opposite effect of the one she intended. Now all she had to do was work out what she had done exactly wrong and fix it to turn her distressing dessert into her Gran’s comforting cake.

But there were quite a few steps to the method that weren’t written down. Meg squeezed her eyes shut, and saw the two of them there, baking in the cramped kitchen together, in their matching aprons, Meg on a stepping stool at the bench.

Was it ‘hum a song that makes you smile’ while you whisk, or while you fold? I’m sure it was turn the sifter clockwise but always whisk widdershins...’

With a sigh, Meg opened her eyes. No, she couldn’t separate the memories of making the cake from the cinnamon rolls, the merengue, the mouse, and all the other types of cakes. They all tended to involve mixing and whisking and flour.

She stood up then to take the mug back to the kitchen, but when she did her eyes fell upon Gran’s apron, hanging from a hook on the side of the pantry, and she started.

In our matching aprons...

After her trip in the the woods the next dawn, Meg made a double serving of strong, black coffee - one for the cake and one for her.

She sipped hers as she busied herself setting out the ingredients and sifted the flour in a carefully clockwise direction. Every step was performed exactly the way she had done them yesterday - except that today she wore her Gran’s apron. Her apron, now. 

The cake went into oven; Meg set the timer with her left hand, and let out a long breath. 

That’s it. That’s definitely it.

Even so, she set a mug of peppermint tea to steep while the cake rose and browned, and didn’t take the apron off. She sat in the couch and didn’t take her eyes off the oven.

When the cake had cooled just enough, Meg took a forkful directly out of the tin. Again, she closed her eyes and waited. 

And there it was. The blanket and the thunderstorm, the enveloping arms, and Gran. Her little smile spread into a huge grin.

“Oh, well done love!”

Meg leapt back from the bench with a squeak.

But yes, there was Gran, hovering bodilessly in the steam still rising from the cake.

“Gran?” Meg asked anyway.

“Yes love, I smelled coffee cake and just thought I’d check in on you. Are you alright dear?”

“Oh!” Meg gathered herself a moment. “Well yes, I was just trying to remember how to make it...”

“And you have! Well done. Now, did you just miss me or does someone need comforting?”

“Aah...well...”

“Well then, make a fresh pot of tea won’t you, this cake’s cooling, and we’ll have a chat.”

Meg’s smile returned, and she wasn’t sure if the ease she felt now as she took out the teapot and an extra mug was still the effect of the cake.

“Have another bite for me, will you?” Gran urged after she had transferred herself to the steam of the second mug of tea.

Meg obliged, and when he Gran didn’t ask any more questions, Meg started to answer them anyway. 

“Gran, I don’t know how to do any of this. I know you taught me everything but, it was so long ago, and now I’m here by myself. I’ve got all your recipes and instructions, but....”

“Not to worry Meg, dear, you’re here, that’s the first thing, and you've done it. Now, the next part.”

Meg took a sip of her tea, leaned into the counter, and waited. It would be alright now, Gran would tell her what to do.

“Now, do you know why it is that we always skip a generation?”

Meg, startled back of her lean, cast about for an answer that her Gran dredged up an answer from what her had taught her. “Um, because witches only even have male sons?”

“That’s how it happens, dear, not why. We skip a generation so that a new witch necessarily cannot learn from her grandmother very far past her childhood.”

“But, how else am I supposed to learn - ?”

“By doing, dear, by trying. A young witch is inevitably left on her own, to come up with her own ideas, to choose who else to talk to and what to throw out with the ashes! How dull and staid we would be if we only ever did what our grandmothers taught us!”

Meg felt rather than heard Gran’s chuckle at that. “But all that training when I was a kid - ”

“Is only training. You’re on your own now so there’s nothing for it but to figure out how to apply it in your own way.” 

There was a hard glint in her eye now which Meg somehow interpreted from the whorls of steam. Meg bowed her head and stared into the steam above her own mug for some time.

“I suppose...” she tried, then sighed. “I suppose you’re right, we would never keep up with the world unless we had to figure our how to live in it for ourselves. That’s why you never wrote down the rest of the steps.”

“Exactly dear. See - you’ll untangle it all in no time! You’ll make a fine witch, I know it.”

“I’ll try Gran, but I really have to know - ”

But Meg was just talking to a mug of tea now. She remained at the bench, though, next to the cake she had made, for a long time. She had no idea what to do next.

But it would be alright.