Eastern European Chocolate Desserts
Eastern Europeans love chocolate and they have some of the finest-grade chocolate at their disposal to create luscious desserts.
Remember to use good-quality chocolate in these recipes to create decadent treats. In most cases, chocolate chips just won't do.
These recipes, but these will give you a head start at baking your way into a loved one's heart.
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Hungarian Trifle (Somloi Galuska) Recipe
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This decadent Hungarian trifle recipe is known as somloi galuska (shom-loh-ee gah-LOOSH-kah), and is made with three different-flavored sponge cakes, pastry cream, raisins, walnuts, chocolate sauce, and whipped cream.
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Jewish Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipe
Shilpa Harolikar / Getty Images This flourless chocolate cake recipe is perfect anytime but especially for Passover because it contains no flour, which, along with other leavening agents, is forbidden by the Torah during the eight days of Passover.
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Hungarian Esterhazy Torte Recipe
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Hungarian Esterhazy torte is a rich dessert consisting of chocolate buttercream sandwiched between four layers of sponge cake. It is purportedly named after 19th-century Prince Esterhazy of Hungary, whose was related to Austrian royalty (and all their fabulous desserts!).
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Hungarian Dobosh Torte Recipe
The Spruce / Cara Cormack
Dobosh Torte, also known as drum torte, is a rich Hungarian sponge cake consisting of seven layers filled with rich chocolate buttercream and topped with caramel. It was invented by and named after Hungarian (some say he was Austrian) pastry chef Jozsef C. Dobos in 1884.
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Croatian Bajadera Torte Recipe
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This is an easy no-cook, no-bake dessert that the kids can help make. This would make a terrific edible gift especially if wrapped in a pretty box.
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Hungarian Chocolate Mousse Cake Recipe - Sutemeny Rigo Jancsi
Proformabooks/Getty ImagesThis traditional recipe for Hungarian Chocolate Mousse Cake has a delightful history. Rigo Jancsi was a famous Hungarian gypsy violinist. In 1896 while in Paris, Jancsi played for Prince Josef and Princess Klara. Fascinated by his swarthy good looks, she fell in love. Klara left her husband and children to follow Jancsi who divorced his wife. The affair didn't last but the cake Rigo created with a confectioner in Klara's honor did.
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Jewish Chocolate Babka Recipe
The Spruce Eats / Julia Hartbeck
This chocolate babka recipe was appropriated from the Poles by Eastern European or Ashkenazi Jews. As with most recipes, changes were made over the years. Instead of being baked in a swirly babka pan the Poles use, most Jewish people bake it in a loaf pan and, often, add a streusel topping. It's a delicious, rich version that is most commonly made in chocolate, cinnamon and almond varieties and, in my opinion, surpasses most Polish babkas I've tasted.