Glossary of sweetmaking

Aletria (sweet vermicelli) Concept: A sweet of fine vermicelli cooked in milk, eggs, sugar and cinnamon, typical of Christmas, akin to a rice pudding made with noodles.
Almond Ingredient: A nut central to the sweets of the Algarve and the convents, used ground in pastes, marzipan and fine confections.
Anise (fennel) Ingredient: An anise-flavoured seed used to scent the doughs of cakes, broas and traditional biscuits.

Bain-marie (water bath) Technique: Gentle cooking in which the vessel sits over or within hot water, used for custards and puddings that must not boil.
Barriga-de-freira (nun's belly) Concept: A convent sweet of yolks, sugar, bread and almond, whose picturesque name illustrates the religious origin of so many Portuguese recipes.
Broa (corn bread/cake) Concept: A dense bread of maize and rye flour; in sweets, broas de mel or Christmas broas are spiced little cakes with honey and dried fruit.
Baking tray Technique: A flat tray on which cakes, biscuits and pastries are arranged and baked; in old pastry shops it was made of tinplate.

Chila gourd (fig-leaf gourd) Ingredient: A gourd whose fibrous flesh breaks into threads when cooked. It is the raw material of chila jam, much used in convent sweetmaking.
Carob Ingredient: The pod of the carob tree, milled into a sweet, dark flour used in the Algarve for cakes and sweets, with a flavour close to cocoa.
Cinnamon Ingredient: An aromatic spice brought by the sea routes, ever-present in Portuguese sweets, dusted over rice pudding, leite-creme and pastéis de nata.
Confectionery Concept: The craft and the shop devoted to confits and sugar sweets — sugared almonds, candied fruit and boiled sweets.
Convent sweetmaking Concept: The body of sweets created in Portuguese convents and monasteries between the 15th and 19th centuries, typically built on egg yolks, sugar and almond.
Chila (gila) jam Concept: A stringy jam made from the flesh of the chila gourd, in a syrup scented with cinnamon and lemon. It fills pastries, turnovers and sweet folar.
Candied fruit Concept: Fruit confited in syrup until translucent and sugar-coated; Elvas is famed for its candied greengage plums.
Cane molasses Ingredient: A dark, thick syrup obtained from sugar cane, traditional to Madeira, where it sweetens the bolo de mel.

Egg-yolk sweet Concept: A cream of yolks cooked in sugar syrup, the base of sweets like ovos moles and the filling of countless specialities.

Fine almond sweets Concept: A family of moulded Algarve sweets made from marzipan, shaped and coloured to imitate fruit, fish and flowers.
Fios de ovos (egg threads) Technique: Very fine golden threads made by pouring egg yolk into boiling syrup. Used to decorate and fill sweets, and even savoury dishes.
Folar (Easter bread) Concept: A festive Easter bread, in sweet or meat-filled versions, sometimes set with a whole boiled egg in its shell pressed into the dough.

Hard-crack point Technique: A high syrup stage, normally placed between 125 and 129 ºC in the Portuguese references consulted, at which a cooled sample becomes hard and brittle.

Leite-creme (custard) Concept: A custard of milk, yolks and sugar, often scorched on top with caramelised sugar, close to crème brûlée.

Marzipan Concept: A paste of ground almond and sugar, moulded into fruits and figures, very typical of the Algarve and of convent sweetmaking.

Oven Technique: A heated chamber for baking; the pastel de nata needs very hot ovens (above 300 ºC) for the pastry to crisp and the custard to blister.
Ovos moles (soft egg sweet) Concept: A sweet of egg yolk and sugar typical of Aveiro, usually wrapped in wafer shaped as sea motifs (whelks, fish, shells). It holds a protected geographical indication.

Portuguese rice pudding Concept: Rice cooked in milk with yolks, sugar and lemon peel, finished with cinnamon. A homely, festive dessert across the whole country.
PGI / PDO Concept: European seals protecting products tied to an origin — Protected Geographical Indication and Protected Designation of Origin — such as the ovos moles de Aveiro.
Puff pastry Technique: A dough of very fine alternating layers of pastry and fat that separate and crisp in the oven. It is the base of the pastel de nata and the travesseiro.
Pão-de-ló (sponge cake) Concept: A light cake of eggs, sugar and flour with no leavening. In versions like that of Ovar it is deliberately moist and creamy in the middle.
Pastel (pastry) Concept: A general term for a small sweet or savoury pastry, usually filled, such as the pastel de nata or the pastel de feijão.
Pastel de nata (custard tart) Concept: A small puff-pastry tart with egg custard, famous in its Belém version, served warm and dusted with cinnamon.
Pastelaria (pastry shop) Concept: Both the craft of making sweets and pastries and the shop itself, central to Portuguese social life, where one takes coffee with a sweet.
Pearl point Technique: A syrup stage near 108 ºC, recognised by its thicker thread and the rounded, pearl-like drop formed at the end.

Quince paste Concept: A firm paste of quince and sugar, ancestor of the very word 'marmalade'. It is sliced and eaten with cheese or bread.
Queijada (cheese tartlet) Concept: A small tartlet of fresh cheese or requeijão, eggs and sugar, famous in Sintra, Évora and Madeira.

Road point Technique: A syrup stage near 110 ºC at which drawing a spoon across the vessel opens a furrow—a ‘road’—that exposes the bottom.
Requeijão (whey cheese) Ingredient: A fresh, soft cheese made from milk whey, usually sheep's or goat's. Sweetened and flavoured, it is the base of sweets such as the pastel de requeijão.

Sugar syrup (the 'point') Technique: Sugar dissolved in water and brought to different cooking 'points', decisive for a sweet's final texture.

Tender (short) pastry Technique: A soft, crumbly dough of flour, fat and water, with no lamination, used in pastries and pies. It yields a tender rather than flaky shell.
Thread point Technique: A light syrup stage, often placed near 103 ºC, at which the sugar runs from a spoon in a fine thread. Published temperatures vary with the convention used.
Trouxas-de-ovos (egg bundles) Concept: Sheets of egg yolk poached in syrup and folded like little bundles, typical of Caldas da Rainha. A convent sweet rich in sugar.

Wafer Ingredient: A very thin sheet of flour-and-water dough, the same as religious communion wafers, used to wrap the ovos moles de Aveiro.

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