Matzah, matzo, or maẓẓah is an unleavened flatbread that is part of Jewish cuisine and forms an integral element of the Passover festival, during which chametz is forbidden.
Confectionery is the art of making confections, which are food items that are rich in sugar and carbohydrates. Exact definitions are difficult. In general, however, confectionery is divided into two broad and somewhat overlapping categories: bakers' confections and sugar confections. The occupation of confectioner encompasses the categories of cooking performed by both the French patissier and the confiseur.
Cake is a flour confection made from flour, sugar, and other ingredients and is usually baked. In their oldest forms, cakes were modifications of bread, but cakes now cover a wide range of preparations that can be simple or elaborate and which share features with desserts such as pastries, meringues, custards, and pies.
Pastry is baked food made with a dough of flour, water, and shortening that may be savoury or sweetened. Sweetened pastries are often described as bakers' confectionery. The word "pastries" suggests many kinds of baked products made from ingredients such as flour, sugar, milk, butter, shortening, baking powder, and eggs. Small tarts and other sweet baked products are called pastries as a synecdoche. Common pastry dishes include pies, tarts, quiches, croissants, and pasties.
Marzipan is a confection consisting primarily of sugar and almond meal, sometimes augmented with almond oil or extract.
Macaroons are small cakes or cookies, originally made from ground almonds, egg whites, and sugar, but now often with coconut or other nuts. They may also include jam, chocolate, or other flavorings.
An alfajor or alajú is a traditional confection typically made of flour, honey, and nuts. It is found in Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, the Philippines, Southern Brazil, Southern France, Spain, Uruguay, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, El Salvador and Chile. The archetypal alfajor entered Iberia during the period of al-Andalus. It is produced in the form of a small cylinder and is sold either individually or in boxes containing several pieces.
Gooey butter cake is a type of cake traditionally made in St. Louis, Missouri. It is a flat and dense cake made with wheat cake flour, butter, sugar, and eggs, typically near an inch tall, and dusted with powdered sugar. While sweet and rich, it is somewhat firm, and is able to be cut into pieces similarly to a brownie. Gooey butter cake is generally served as a type of coffee cake and not as a formal dessert cake. There are two distinct variants of the cake: the original St. Louis, MO Bakers' gooey butter and a cream cheese and commercial yellow cake mix variant. The original St. Louis, MO Bakers' gooey butter is believed to have originated in the 1930s. It was made with a yeast-raised sweet dough on the bottom.
Jewish cuisine refers to the worldwide cooking traditions of the Jewish people. During its evolution over the course of many centuries, it has been shaped by Jewish dietary laws (kashrut), Jewish festivals and holidays, and traditions centred around Shabbat. Jewish cuisine is influenced by the economics, agriculture, and culinary traditions of the many countries where Jewish communities have settled and varies widely throughout the entire world.
A macaron or French macaroon is a sweet meringue-based confection made with egg white, icing sugar, granulated sugar, almond meal, and often food colouring.
Black-and-white cookies, half-and-half cookies, and half-moon cookies are similar round cookies iced or frosted in two colors, with one half vanilla and the other chocolate. They are found in the Northeastern United States and Florida. Black-and-white cookies are flat, have fondant or sometimes royal icing on a dense cake base, and are common in the New York metropolitan area. Half-moon cookies are slightly dome-shaped (convex), have frosting on a fluffy angel cake base, and are common in Central New York and Boston, Massachusetts.
Flourless chocolate cake is a dense cake made from an aerated chocolate custard. The first documented form of the cake was seen in Ferrara, Italy, though some forms of the cake have myths surrounding their origins. The dessert contains no gluten which makes it acceptable for those with celiac disease, gluten-free diets, and during religious holidays in which gluten and grains are not permitted.
Sponge cake is a light cake made with eggs, flour and sugar, sometimes leavened with baking powder. Some sponge cakes do not contain egg yolks, like angel food cake, but most of them do. Sponge cakes, leavened with beaten eggs, originated during the Renaissance, possibly in Spain. The sponge cake is thought to be one of the first non-yeasted cakes, and the earliest attested sponge cake recipe in English is found in a book by the English poet Gervase Markham, The English Huswife, Containing the Inward and Outward Virtues Which Ought to Be in a Complete Woman (1615). Still, the cake was much more like a cracker: thin and crispy. Sponge cakes became the cake recognised today when bakers started using beaten eggs as a rising agent in the mid-18th century. The Victorian creation of baking powder by English food manufacturer Alfred Bird in 1843 allowed the addition of butter to the traditional sponge recipe, resulting in the creation of the Victoria sponge. Cakes are available in many flavours and have many recipes as well. Sponge cakes have become snack cakes via the Twinkie.
Jewish almond cookie, also known as a Chinese cookie, is a popular Jewish cookie made with almonds and commonly served at Jewish delis and eateries.
Impade is a cookie of Sephardi Jewish origin that is most commonly found among members of the Venetian Jewish community and their descendants, and is traditionally prepared at Purim, but is also prepared year round.
Marunchinos, also known as Sephardi macaroons, is a popular Israeli cookie of Sephardi Jewish origin made with ground blanched almonds or almond flour, egg whites, sugar or more traditionally honey, spices, and oftentimes dried fruit and orange blossom or rose water, that is traditionally made during Passover (Pesach), as it is one of the few desserts which is unleavened and does not contain chametz.
Hadji bada, also known as Iraqi Jewish almond cookies, is a popular Israeli cookie of Sephardi Jewish origin made with ground blanched almonds or walnuts, egg whites, sugar or more traditionally honey, spices, and oftentimes topped with whole almonds and infused with rose water, that is traditionally made during Passover (Pesach), as it is one of the few desserts which is unleavened and does not contain chametz.
