RU  UK  EN
Статьи  >  Enjoy  >  From Kyiv with Cake

From Kyiv with Cake

Автор: 31.01.2019 | Ukraine, Kyiv
Airports, railways and bus stations in Kyiv aren’t much different from similar objects in other big cities. But that’s just at first sight. If you have a slightly closer look at passengers, you can see that every third one carries a round white-and-green box. It is in it where the part of the majestic city, that can be legally carried away as a souvenir, is – we mean the famous Kyiv Cake.

Gastronomic legend of the Ukrainian capital and the country as a whole has struck with its sophisticated taste for over sixty years. Official launching date of the Kyiv Cake, Kyiv’s most popular souvenir, is 1956. Its creation became overgrown with myths and mysteries a long time ago, but all of them can be divided into two large concepts of the cake’s creation: accidental and on purpose. According to the former one, the dessert, that was destined to become the hottest-selling item, a terrible deficit and even a kind of currency in Soviet times, emerged as a result of a mistake of a young employee of a giant confectionary factory that bore the name of Karl Marx back in 1950s. Allegedly, 17-year old pastry-cook Nadiya Chornohor forgot to put egg whites away to cold so they stayed entire night in warm temperature to turn into semi-liquid substance. In the morning, upon being severely reprimanded by her supervisor, the girl supposedly suggested hiding the misdeed by cooking crunchy pie crusts with nuts, complement them with Charlotte custard and decorate the surface with colorful patterns. And just like that, to get away scot-free, Nadiya Chornohor and her boss Konstantyn Petrenko came up with a base that struck big shots of the factory with its uncommon combination, so the former ones approved mass production of the cake and called it, to spare brain-racking efforts, Kyiv.0_79gLlnPerLqvUaey.jpgPhoto medium.com

The other consept, sure enough, lacks romance and is even dry unlike the delight itself. According to it, experiments in order to make a new cake were being held on the abovementioned factory by edict coming from the top becasue there was a traditional goal of those times facing them: to create something special "for a festive date". And it was during testing recipes for fillings and crusts when the combination was invented and later perfected for it to be kept as top secret and for millions to develop affection towards it. The fact, that the original recipe of the Kyiv Cake contained cashew and palm oil, so rare and expensive for Ukraine that nobody had a faintest idea about them without specialized consignments, testifies in favor of this version. However back in the days the USSR made friends and maintained active trade with India and thank to connections of the communist highest ranks, management of the Kyiv confectionery factory had access to aspired products to hold their tests with. Therefore nobody could make a cake of such expensive ingredients by accident.il_fullxfull.1626339413_8qpj.jpgPhoto etsy.com

Today there is no tellinfg for sure what really happened and each lover of the cake can stick to the story he or she feels like, so let's talk about hard facts. As soon as in 1960s, after being the fashion merchandise, Kyiv Cake at the price of three rubles and thirty kopeks (given average monthly salary of 100 rubles) became the most famous dessrt in the entire Soviet Union. With all the huge demand, it was sold in several selling spots of the city, but it had no influence at its status of a deficit, which meant that in order to taste it or purchase it as a gift, one had to wait in block-long lines and overpay. Vendors from such shops as Ukrainian Delights and Central Grocery Store, selling the cakes, used to become significant friends of a family, as nearly as relatives, because one could ask them to hold back the sought-after dessert.

Driving or flying somewhere from Kyiv without bringing the sweet souvenir was one of the most dreadful "crimes" of those years, even relatives quarreled over it not to mention friends or colleagues who were expecting the aspired delight as much as the person bringing it. Today it is hard to believe, but especially for transport it to distant republics – to Caucasus or Middle Asia – people used to freeze the dessert and carry it gently wrapped in bedcovers for it not to get spoiled or crushed. Famous round boxes, initially depicting Pedestrian Bridge over the Dnipro River, that was later replaced with another symbol of Kyiv, chestnut tree, were raised to the status of iconic ones, and there was never enough of their contents, even despite production capacities with normal production rate of one pastry-cook over one shift at the factory constituting 120 cakes – and given a number of employees in shops, it is even hard to imagine production volumes...rtur6uynsr.jpgPhoto focus.ua

In years of crisis, 1980s-1990s artisans, who were bringing the pleasure of the Kyiv Cake to the world, stood up to the onset of capitalism time with its expensiveness, when they had to refuse cashew in favor of cheaper hazelnut and later peanut. Number of produced cakes dropped first to turn them into unthinkable deficit in the last years of the USSR’s existence – due to it, the delight used to be stolen from means of transport and in the streets. Later, the main souvenir disappeared from the market for a while.

Nowadays Kyiv Cake is produced in large quantities and it continues to be liked by a lot of people. Despite incredible number of cakes in shops and the fact that one doesn’t have to overpay for or become obliged to those who could obtain them, the legendary dessert hasn’t become a less desired souvenir – both people who lived in the time of USSR and new generation of tourists, including the ones from the West, bring it home nostalgically from the capital of Ukraine, because, all legends aside, the cake really is fabulously tasty and distinctive. If it hadn’t been like that, it simply wouldn’t have survived in the free market when goods from all over the world flooded soviet shelves. This means that the Kyiv Cake fully deserves the attention and public affection that emerged over sixty years ago.5116130f09236cab01520ca1c93a8c0a.jpgMini-sculpture "Kyiv cake" by artist Daria Vovk in Kyiv, photo mag.relax.ua

Cover photo 1plus1.ua

Вам это будет интересно:
Eternal love. Monuments to love in Ukraine
How much love weights and can its volume be measued? Does it have a garvity center and how it behaves in hours of ardent heat ot snow storms? Sure enough, love is an ethereal feeling that rather resembles crazy butterflies dancing in your stomach. However people, who have deep feelings, have learned to "create love" and convey its meaning in stone, wood or metal for others.
Malanka and Vasyl winter fun: Carnival in Ukrainian style
The New Year in Ukraine did not always start with a Christmas tree, and instead of Santa Claus and Snow Maiden, guests were waiting fora minx girl - Malanka and motor-boy Vasyl accompanied by the retinue. All the follies were out of hand: the ridiculed riddles carried a sacred content, dictated by the logic of the myth of the duel of spring and winter.
Christmas Eve and What’s to Follow
Christmas arrives with a warm overjacket on its shoulders. At night it brings warm light of the first evening star and in the morning it wakes you up with shine of white but warm sun. If my great-grandmonther’s grandmother had been asked about her Christmas feelings, I believe, her words would have been identical to mine. Because together with a bowl of kutia,...
Museums that cure
“I’d like some headache elixir, mandrake root extract, heart pills and a bit of morphine, please…” – this is about how patients addressed pharmacists a couple hundred years ago. They, in turn, were preparing various magmas and mixtures in pharmacological laboratories situated as near as in the next room. Sure, nowadays technologies have significantly advanced, “remedy stores” fit in kiosks while drug-containing medicines cannot be bought without prescription…
What do they eat: Ukraine
Spoiled with home-made borshch, holubtsy and cotlets, we are under an illusion that we know Ukrainian cuisine like the tips of own fingers and there is nothing distinctive about it while in fact gastronomic heritage of our country is far richer than a grandma’s ingenuous menu. Time has come to recall original Ukrainian dishes that were undeservedly forgotten in the era of semi-cooked products and fast food.
Life on water: 7 little-known Venice competitors
When we hear about "water city", Venice immediately comes to mind, doesn’t it? Tranquil gondolas, narrow waterways, gentle light of the evening sun and ancient architecture create that heady romantic cocktail which attracts tourists from all over the world to the Italian city.
Ukrainian gardens of Babylon
Have you ever noticed how parks attrack us when it gets warmer outside? And what happens when you suddenly get there? Time stands still, something starts pulsating inside you, and your body seems to plant out fresh sprouts. OUTLOOK encourages you to visit the most beautiful arboreta of Ukraine, which you will exit feeling double alive.
VIDEO: Antique and industrial Kyiv
When sending stuff to trash can or throwing it away to a dumpster we don’t suspect that it doesn’t always mean death for it, now and then even in the contrary – it is a beginning of a new life…
The most stunning flower fields in the world
Flower fields and valleys are impressive and attract attention of the most discerning connoisseurs of beauty. Multi-coloured deposits of fragrant plants adorn vast valleys of almost every country, in the most distant parts of the world. We offer several options for such floral carpets for every taste.
History of the street: Dmytro Yavornytsky Avenue
With this feature on the main street of Dnipro, Dmytro Yavornytsky Avenue, we continue our rubric, dedicated to the history of differnt streets. Dmytro Yavornytsky Avenue is not just a central and most important street of Dnipro in every respect – it is also the picture of the many-centuries-long history of the city.
Flowers in Ukrainian Style. Kateryna Bilokur
Today marks 120 years since the birth of the famous Ukrainian artist - Kateryna Bilokur. Her talent has been recognized in her lifetime, her work has been admired by Pablo Picasso, and nowadays her paintings are exhibited in museums, and Google dedicates its doodle to her. And it all started in totalitarian times...
Director-General of the OUTLOOK Daria Kariakina on the Role of Public Initiatives in the Field of Cultural Diplomacy
On November 18 Director-General of the OUTLOOK Project and a public figure Daria Kariakina participated as an expert in a cross-border project European Values and Cultural Diplomacy: Youth Meetings Ukraine – Georgia.
On the catwalk: Ukraine
Traditional Ukrainian clothes are absolutely unique, bright and distinctive. So there is no surprise that they still remain relevant for both Ukrainian and foreign fashion-mongers. In recent years designers of the world create entire collection “based on” the main symbol – vyshyvanka (embroidered clothing) – and many celebrities now and then put on shirts with magic ornamentation believing them to be the summit of elegance.
World ghettos: Ukrainian Neighborhood in Chicago
Experience has proven that ethnic enclaves by and large are autonomous and closed-loop systems because living there one can stay non-assimilated and non-integrated into another culture at all. But that cannot be said about Ukrainian Village – Ukrainian district of Chicago, already famous around entire United States.
Vyshyvanka Day 2020! Diplomats of foreign embassies support the celebration
For many years in a row, Ukrainians around the world, by wearing national costumes for work, for a walk around the city or just for photography, celebrate the Vyshyvanka Day. This year, the celebration took place on May 21 and was joined by representatives of foreign embassies accredited in Ukraine.
If you have 10 dollars and you are in Lviv
OUTLOOK, though by all means being an international and cosmopolitic project, so today we will talk about how you can spend $10 in one of the brightest Ukrainian cities - in Lviv.
Hutsuls: Ukrainian highlanders
How can we blame foreigners for not knowing our country, even if the native Ukrainians now and then mistakenly and stereotypically refer to all the inhabitants of the western regions of Ukraine as the Hutsuls. Hearing it, representatives of this ethnic group of Ukrainian, isolated by picturesque nature of the Carpathians, just smile. We suggest to climb up with to their mountain villages and get more acquainted.
OUTLOOK: for the Day of Independence of Ukraine...
Today in honor of Independence Day of Ukraine OUTLOOK prepared interesting stories about sites that are in UNESCO world heritage list ! We want not only to see beauty of foreign cultures and places of interest but also to pay attention on Ukrainian ones!!!
GDIP celebrates its 27th anniversary and the Diplomats offer congratulations!
On May 16, 2019, Embroidery Day and the 27th anniversary of the founding of the State Enterprise “Directorate-General for Rendering Services to Diplomatic Missions” were celebrated at the Kyiv National Academic Operetta Theatre.
Charitable dance. Foreign diplomats attended the annual ball in the IIR
The Institute of International Relations of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and personally the director Valerii Kopiika invited everyone to support the student initiative of the Charity Ball IIR-2019.
Закрыть
Outlook facebook page