Esquecidos
Also known as: Broinhas · Sugar broas
Beaten so long that the name comes from the cook who forgot what she was doing.
- Origin
- Festive home baking from Portugal's central interior, above all the Beiras and the Serra da Estrela; rural in origin, exact date unknown.
- Region
- Bragança
- Season
- Easter
Esquecidos are small, light, dry spoon-dropped cakes made from little more than eggs, sugar and flour. The batter, beaten at length until airy, is dropped in spoonfuls onto a tray and baked, where it spreads and catches just a touch of colour, taking on the golden hue and crisp little shell that define them.
They are a sweet of the home and of occasion, closely tied to Easter: they appeared at the table whenever there were eggs to spare and a reason to celebrate. For all their near-Franciscan simplicity, they ask for patience and a practised hand.
Don't be fooled by the humble name: few sweets say as much about the resourceful thrift of Portuguese country kitchens, which coaxed a treat out of the most modest trio of ingredients.
- Eggs
- Sugar
- Wheat flour
- Lemon zest (optional)
- Pinch of salt
Light and dry, with a fine crisp shell that gives way to an airy, almost baked-meringue crumb. Sweet without cloying, with the clean flavour of egg and sugar and, when used, a faint breath of lemon. They melt in the mouth and have you reaching for the next.
Recipes vary from house to house: some use only yolks, others the whole egg with the whites whipped to stiff peaks for extra lift. Some perfume the batter with lemon zest or cinnamon, and across much of the Beiras the same sweet goes by the name broinhas. Around Guarda there is also a leavened, more substantial version baked in a wood-fired oven. The degree of beating and the size of the spoonful decide whether they come out taller and fluffier or thinner and crunchier.
These are above all a homemade sweet, more easily found in an interior kitchen at Easter than in a shop window. Look for them in traditional bakeries and pastry shops of the Beiras and the Serra da Estrela — Guarda, Covilhã, Fundão and around — at regional food fairs and markets, or, better still, ask whoever still makes them by hand at home.
They call for a strong coffee or a cup of tea, and shine beside a glass of Moscatel or a fortified wine. At the Easter table they keep good company with other egg sweets and sugared almonds.
The name comes from the making itself. The batter demanded such prolonged beating — half an hour or more by hand, always in the same direction — that, so the tradition goes, the cook would end up 'forgetting' what she was about, leaving the eggs and sugar to pale as her mind wandered. This is home baking, with no convent author and no fixed date: it was born in household kitchens and handed down from one generation to the next.
Its documented home is Portugal's central interior — Guarda, Covilhã, Fundão and the Serra da Estrela region — where it features in the inventory of traditional Portuguese products. Like so many egg-rich sweets of the interior, it followed the rhythm of the henhouse and the church calendar: it was above all an Easter sweet, found on the table when the priest made his Paschal visit, and it returned at Christmas and the great family feasts, when eggs were plentiful and there were hands to spare for the long beating.
Sources: tradicional.dgadr.gov.pt · mulherportuguesa.com · gastronomias.com · receitasemenus.net · turismodocentro.pt