It’s a brand new month, which means…….IT’S FANY FEBRUARY!
Maybe you don’t know what Fany February is- particularly since I made it up. But it’s super awesome! Promise!
Many of you here in NYC know Fany Gerson as the owner of La Newyorkina, maker of the best paletas (aka Mexican ice pops) on earth. Some of you around the country as the author of My Sweet Mexico, one of the greatest cookbooks ever written. Matt and I know her as a good friend, and one of the most wonderful, generous people we have ever known.
We used to share a kitchen with Fany, but last year she moved to Red Hook. And when Sandy came, it destroyed everything in her kitchen. She has two of these gigantic machines that allow her to make and freeze the paletas- without them, she’s only be able to prepare a small amount of product every day (that is, if Sandy hadn’t also destroyed her freezers). Each of those machines cost over $20,000. They also come from Argentina, so the freight costs are significant. Both machines were completely submerged by saltwater and were irreparably destroyed.
Fany ran a successful Kickstarter and has been working her ass off to get her company back to where it was, but to be honest, she’s just trying to get back up and running. As someone who’s been her friend for years, this girl has put EVERYTHING into La Newyorkina- blood, sweat, tears, lost sleep (LOTS of lost sleep)- and there is no reason she needs to be finding ways to just squeak by by the skin of her teeth because the insurers are finding creative ways to deny her claims, no reason why she should be sitting home with her fingers crossed that her FEMA loans will be approved and she’ll be able to get back to business as usual.
And hopefully, she won’t have a reason. Because Fany has a lot of friends who love her very, very much.
Starting today and continuing til the end of the month, we are donating a chunk of the profits of our Fany brownie directly to the lovely Ms. Gerson (and yes, this brownie was named after her). It’s our dark chocolate brownie base spiked with Mexican cinnamon, swirled with sweet sexy cajeta. You can order them online in both 4 and 12 packs- get some for yourself to store in the freezer for any time you need a quick hit of chocolate, or send some to someone you love for Valentine’s Day or Lincoln’s Birthday.
And that’s not all! It wouldn’t be warranted for us to declare this Fany February if it was just little old us- LOTS of her friends are pitching in to help our girl out! Here’s who’s signed on so far:
Whimsy & Spice: Portion of the profits from their whisky cookie (Fany’s favorite)
Danny Macaroons: Special dulce de leche macaroon available at select locations
Liddabit Sweets: Portion of all profits from items sold at the Brooklyn Flea
Butter & Scotch: Portion of profits from Mexican Chocolate at Brooklyn Flea
Roni Sue’s Chocolates: 50% of the Chili Lover’s Collection
Brooklyn Cured: Portion of profits from the Park Slope Farmer’s Market
We’ll be adding more friends as people return my emails- if you’d also like to be a part of Fany February, shoot me an email at allison at robicellis.com and I’ll add you to the master list up top! And I’ll make sure everyone on Twitter knows about it!
And now off brownies, and onto the cupcakes that are in today’s rotation. They’re plenty delicious, too. You should eat them AND order brownies, because why the hell not? It’s Friday, right?
Tres Leches: Three milk soaked brown butter cake, dulce de leche buttercream, caramel shards
Chai Latte: Chai spiced cake, mascarpone buttercream, toasted chai spices
Ebinger: Chocolate cake, chocolate custard buttercream, chocolate fudge, cake crumbs
Banana Cream Pie: Banana cake, vanilla custard, custard buttercream, banana chip, graham cracker crumbs
