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16 recipes

Khanom kleeb lamduanFlower shortbread cookies

Named after the lamduan, a fragrant cream-coloured flower with three curled petals, these tiny Thai shortbreads are a classic of the royal-style Thai sweets once made in palace kitchens and now sold in Bangkok's old dessert shops and given at weddings and merit-making. Each flower is three teardrop petals around a ball, pale and fragile, and they melt like sandy fudge. Their perfume comes from tian op, a special scented dessert candle: it is lit, blown out, and left to smoke inside a closed container with the cookies. If you cannot find one, a little jasmine water in the dough gives a different but lovely scent. The mistake is baking them hot or long; they should stay ivory, never golden. Chef's tip: candle smoke is real fire and smoke, so do it in a metal or ceramic pot, well away from curtains and children, with the flame blown out before the lid goes on.

78 minThaiBakingVegan
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Khanom khai (Thai egg cakes)

Khanom khai are the tiny golden sponge cakes that Thai market vendors bake in heavy brass moulds, filling the air with a sweet, eggy smell, and Bangkok children buy a paper bag of them after school. They are light and spongy inside with crisp, caramelised edges, and taste of egg and vanilla. They're made with oil rather than butter. They contain egg and gluten. Without a traditional mould, a mini-muffin or madeleine tin works well. Chef's tip: beat the eggs and sugar until really thick and pale; all the lift comes from that air.

30 minThaiBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Postre MassiniCustard sponge with burnt sugar top

Montevideo's birthday cake of choice since the early twentieth century, the Massini is two thin layers of sponge sandwiching a thick filling of whipped cream folded with egg-yolk custard, crowned with a thin glassy crust of torched yolk and sugar. Bakeries across Uruguay sell it on Sundays. Traditional versions sometimes add a sweet fortified wine to the custard; this one is alcohol-free. The custard is cooked to a safe 71 °C. The common mistake is assembling with warm custard, which melts the cream into a puddle. Chef's tip: if you don't have a blowtorch, put the sugared top under a very hot grill for a minute and watch it closely.

80 minParaguayanBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

VánočkaBraided Christmas bread

On Czech Christmas Eve morning, before the carp and the potato salad, the table holds a long golden vánočka, a sweet braided loaf whose layered plaits are said to represent the baby Jesus in swaddling. Families slice it for breakfast through the holidays with butter, honey or jam. The crumb is soft and rich with egg and butter, scented with lemon zest and studded with raisins; flaked almonds crisp up on the crust. The usual slip is braiding too loosely, so the tiers slide apart in the oven; plait tightly and hold them with wooden skewers while baking. Soaking raisins in warm water (not rum) keeps them juicy and alcohol-free. Chef's tip: vánočka keeps for days wrapped in a cloth, and slightly stale slices make superb French toast.

185 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

JidášeEaster honey buns

Maundy Thursday, "Green Thursday" in Czech, is the day for jidáše, sweet yeasted buns rolled into ropes and coiled into spirals or loose knots to recall the rope of Judas, which gives them their name. Families in Bohemia and Moravia bake them for breakfast that morning and brush them, still hot, with honey; eating one was once said to bring health for the year. They are soft and fluffy, lightly scented with lemon, with a sticky, shiny top. A common mistake is brushing the honey on cold buns, where it just sits; warm the honey and glaze them straight from the oven so it soaks in. Honey is not suitable for babies under one year old. Chef's tip: roll the ropes thinner than you think, about finger thickness; they double as they prove.

145 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Bratislavské rožkyWalnut or poppy seed crescents

Bakers in old Pressburg, today's Bratislava, have shaped these little horns for nearly three centuries, and the city still treats them as its own Christmas and wedding pastry. The walnut ones are bent into a horseshoe and the poppy seed ones into a crescent, so you can tell them apart on the plate. The dough is rich and short, almost like a pastry, and the shiny brown top is crazed with fine cracks from a double egg glaze. A common mistake is glazing the second time before the first coat is dry, which leaves a dull, smooth top instead of the famous marbling. Patience is the whole trick: a cool rest after the yolk, then a warm rest after the white. Old recipes add a splash of rum to the walnut filling; this version uses lemon and cinnamon instead. Chef's tip: keep the dough cold and work quickly, so the butter stays in tiny flakes.

150 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

BublaninaCherry sponge traybake

Czech grandmothers make bublanina the moment cherries ripen in June, and again with apricots or plums later in summer, baking it in a big tray for afternoon coffee in the garden. The name comes from the bubbles that form as the fruit sinks into the batter. It is a light, buttery sponge, golden at the edges, with pockets of juicy, sharp fruit and a snowfall of icing sugar on top; children love it warm. A common mistake is folding in the flour too hard, which knocks out the air and makes a tough cake; mix until just combined. Pitted fruit is easiest for little eaters. Chef's tip: toss the fruit in a spoon of flour before scattering it over, so it sits in the sponge instead of sinking to the bottom.

50 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

ZelňákSauerkraut yeast pie

Out in the Moravian wine villages, when bread was baked in the communal oven, the last of the dough went into zelňák: a flat yeast base spread with sour cabbage and fried onion and baked until the edges blister. It is still sold in bakeries around Brno and Hodonín and eaten warm in slices with a glass of buttermilk or new wine. Old recipes fry the onion in lard or add crackling; this version uses oil and butter and is vegetarian. The topping is tangy, sweet from the onion and scented with caraway, over a soft, bready base. Where it often goes wrong is using wet sauerkraut straight from the jar, which turns the base soggy. Squeeze it well and fry it first. Chef's tip: a thin layer of sour cream under the cabbage keeps the base moist and stops the topping drying out.

120 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

FrgályYeast tarts with pear or cheese

At weddings and church fairs in Moravian Wallachia, in the hills around Rožnov and Vsetín, tables are stacked with frgály: yeast tarts as wide as a dinner plate, rolled so thin the filling seems to sit on a crisp, chewy disc. The classic toppings are dried pear mixed with plum butter, sweet tvaroh (Czech quark), or poppy seed, all scattered with a buttery crumble. This recipe makes four, two with each of the first two fillings. Tvaroh is usually set without rennet, but some brands use it, so check the label. The usual slip is leaving the dough thick in the middle, which makes a bready tart; roll right to the edge, about 3 mm thick. Chef's tip: bake on the lowest oven shelf on a hot tray, so the base browns before the filling dries.

150 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

ChajáSponge, peach and cream cake

Chajá was created in 1927 at a bakery in Paysandú, a city on the Uruguay River, and named after a local bird whose feathers look as fluffy as its crumbly meringue coat. Today it's Uruguay's birthday and celebration cake: layers of light sponge soaked in peach syrup, filled with whipped cream, peaches and dulce de leche, then covered in crushed meringue. It's sweet, soft and crunchy at once, best on the day it's assembled. Chef's tip: soak the sponge but not too much; it should feel moist, not wet, or the layers slide.

90 minParaguayanBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

BuchtyFilled baked yeast buns

Buchty are the soft, pillowy yeast buns that Czech grandmothers bake in a roasting tin on Saturday, filled with povidla (plum butter), jam or sweet quark and packed so close that they rise into each other and have to be torn apart. They are the Czech answer to a cinnamon bun: eaten warm with milky coffee, packed for train journeys and school trips, and famous from the fairy tale in which the hero sets off with a bag of his mother's buchty. Unlike open koláče, the filling is sealed inside. Chef's tip: brush the sides of each bun with melted butter before you pack them in, so they pull apart cleanly with soft, shiny walls.

70 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Moravské koláčeFilled yeast buns

In the villages of South Moravia and Wallachia, nobody gets married without a mountain of koláče: small round yeast buns with a deep hollow filled with sweetened poppy seed, vanilla quark or povidla (thick plum butter), each crowned with buttery posypka crumble. Relatives bake hundreds for the wedding and send guests home with boxes of them, and they turn up again at village fairs (pouť) and Sunday coffee. Chef's tip: press the hollow deep and wide just before filling; the dough rises again in the oven, and a shallow dip pushes the filling over the edge.

80 minCzechBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Arabian date pinwheels

Crumbly, buttery biscuit dough is rolled out, spread with a soft date filling flavoured with cinnamon and lemon, rolled into logs, sliced and baked into pretty pinwheels. They make a big batch of 50 and keep well in an airtight tin. Serve with tea, or with ice cream as a dessert.

60 minMiddle EasternBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Lebanese date cake

A soft, moist cake made without eggs: self-raising flour and brown sugar are rubbed with butter, then mixed with milk and sour cream and studded with chopped dates, raisins and pistachios, with a warm hint of nutmeg and vanilla. Lovely with tea or served warm with cream.

70 minMiddle EasternBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views

Ma'amoulDate and walnut butter pastries

Ma'amoul are delicate shortbread-like pastries made for Eid and Easter across the Middle East. A soft, rose-scented butter dough is wrapped around a filling of dates, walnuts, almonds and pistachios cooked with cinnamon, marked with a fork, baked pale and dusted with icing sugar. Makes 35; they keep well in a tin.

80 minMiddle EasternBaking
by KrazyBadal 1 views

Semolina cake

A moist eggless cake made with semolina, coconut and yogurt, baked with slivered almonds on the bottom and top and moistened with orange juice. Serve with coconut ice cream or custard sauce.

45 minMiddle EasternBaking
by KrazyBadal 0 views