Sweets | Page 10 of 11

Blueberry dumplings from Kohútka

Tigelada: A Portuguese Dessert from the Oven

In the 16th century a Portuguese infanta carried the recipe for tigelada to Italy as part of her dowry; today this baked dessert of eggs, milk and sugar also sits in the chillers of Portuguese supermarkets. Its home is central Portugal, where two official recipes live side by side - one with sugar, the other with honey and goat's milk - and every August it gets a festival of its own.

Beijinhos de Amor: Sweet Kisses from Lousada

Three whole eggs and fifteen yolks for barely six hundred grams of dough - the recipe alone gives away the convent pedigree of beijinhos de amor. Kisses of love, little egg-yolk cakes in a sugar shell from Lousada in Portugal, keep for months and survive the trip home in a suitcase. Where does the name come from, and why does the best-known maker sit outside the town's own boundary?

Cornetto: The Italian Answer to the Croissant

The cornetto is the Italian counterpart of the croissant: layered leavened dough shaped into a crescent, with eggs and sugar worked in, softer and sweeter than the French original and almost always filled with custard cream, chocolate, marmalade or pistachio cream. In northern Italy it's a brioche, on a shop shelf a croissant, at the counter a cornetto. You eat it in the morning with a cappuccino, and its family tree goes back to medieval Vienna, not to Paris.

Pardulas: Sardinian Ricotta Pastries

Pardulas are small Sardinian pastries of pinched dough, filled with sheep's milk ricotta flavored with saffron and citrus zest and baked golden. Originally an Easter sweet that children were given on All Souls', they are baked in Sardinia all year round today - and the name and the filling change with every part of the island: in some places they are filled with fresh cheese, in others raisins go in too. What they are named after is still anybody's guess.

Crostata: The Italian Lattice Tart

Crostata is an Italian tart of crumbly pastry with a layer of jam or custard and a lattice of pastry strips on top. At home it's baked on Sundays, in a bar it's served with coffee, and in a bakery you buy it by weight. It is named after the crust, not the filling, and it appears under that name in 15th-century Italian recipe books. Its closest relative is the Austrian Linzer Torte.

Gueffus: Sardinian Almond Balls in Colorful Wrappers

Gueffus are Sardinian almond balls: ground almonds, sugar and lemon zest are simply cooked in a pot, rolled, coated in sugar, and each ball is twisted up in a colorful fringed wrapper like a sweet. They're made all over Sardinia under several names, and they belong at weddings, christenings and Christmas - and the legend about the battlements on the wrapper was invented by a novelist.

Delizia al Limone: The Lemon Dessert of Sorrento and Amalfi

Delizia al limone is a lemon dessert from the Italian region of Campania: two sponge domes sandwiched with lemon cream, soaked in limoncello syrup and coated in a thick lemon glaze. It was created in 1978 by the Sorrento pastry chef Carmine Marzuillo, and it nearly ended up being called a lemon sigh. Today the whole coast from Sorrento through Amalfi to Naples claims it.

Antica Gelateria Sorrentina, Sorrento

Spa Wafers: A Crisp Sweet from Karlovy Vary and Other Spa Towns

Spa wafers are two thin round sheets of crisp dough stuck together with a sweet filling of sugar, nuts, cinnamon or chocolate. Karlovy Vary has the oldest record of baking them, and a protected designation that demands thermal spring water in the dough, but it was Mariánské Lázně that gave them the shape they have today. Where the wafers got their name, why three countries fought over them, and why you should buy the warm one on the colonnade.