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Makowiec
Seattle Center Polish Festival, $2
From the dozen-plus temptations on the Polish Festival's dessert table, I chose a fat slice of makowiec, a bready roll coiled around poppy seed paste filling as dense and dark as asphalt, topped with slivered almonds pasted down with royal icing.
Cheese Pocket and Almond Cookie (top)
Cheese Strudel (below)
Budapest Bistro and Schnitzel House
Growing up in Hungary in her grandparents' home taught Elizabeth Muszka a particular kind of self-reliance. Since there wasn't much money to spare on restaurants or fancy ingredients, Elizabeth learned young that in order to eat well, they had to cook well.
Today the owner of Mukilteo's Budapest Bistro and Schnitzel House specializes in Hungarian, German, and Gypsy dishes--and in cooking well. Starting with traditional recipes and simple ingredients, Elizabeth lavishes attention on each item.
The pastry case stuffed with fresh zserbo (apricot-walnut-chocolate pastry), dobos torte (layered sponge with chocolate and caramel), sour cherry cake, German chocolate cake, strudels (below), and cookies (above) is even more of a marvel when you consider that the strudel dough alone takes three hours to make.
But for ex-pats who hunger for something other than home cooking, Elizabeth also stocks a large selection of packaged European candies and treats (below).
Budapest Bistro and Schnitzel House
12926 Mukilteo Speedway
Lynwood WA
425/513-9846
Almond Horn
P.S. Suisse, $2.85
Langley, Washington is not so much small as concentrated: you could drive in one end and out the other in about 45 seconds, or you could pull over and spend all day exploring bookshops, cafes, spas, boutiques, the world's best-organized thrift store, and, at the far end of a tiny pedestrian mall, the P.S. Suisse bakery.
Originally from Ligerz in western Switzerland, Peter Boden served a 3-year apprenticeship in Davos then worked as a confectioner and pastry chef in hotels and restaurants around Europe. After moving to America, he first worked in Illinois, then Michigan, then relocated again to Colorado--as much for the skiing as for the kitchens. Some of the framed memorabilia on the walls at P.S. Suisse comes from this period, including a feature story on the Vail Grand Marnier Chef's ski race, with a picture of Peter schussing down a slopes in apron and toque.
After several years as the co-owner of Vail's Alpenrose restaurant (est. 1975), Peter took some time off to concentrate on producing his sought-after chocolate sculptures and paintings...and somehow ended up in Langley, WA, in a tiny shop at the end of a small mall. I would've liked to ask about that, but the lunch rush crowding the bakery's few tables put a damper on investigation.
Peter's wife Sandra covers the front of the house, hustling plates and extracting pastries from the crowded cases. The cookie choices include spitzbuben (or "rascals," two-layer sandwiches with jam filling peeking out through holes in the upper cookie), linzer (similar to spitzbuben but made with hazelnut dough), shortbread Orcas painted with milk or dark chocolate, and almond horns (above) wrought from mildly sweet marzipan dough, dark chocolate, and a glassy sugar-egg-almond glaze. There are also strudels, tarts, danishes, Napoleons, croissants, and a shelf full of breads.
As the shop's sole baker and cook, Peter has plenty to do in back. In addition to keeping the cases and bread rack full and whipping up lunch plates, there are the seasonal specials. During my visit Peter was hard at work filling orders for Engadin nusstorte, a shortcrust pastry stuffed with walnuts, honey, and cream. A traditional holiday-time treat, the Engadin is named for the valley surrounding St. Moritz and is a soft-spoken reminder of the poverty endured by generations of Swiss villagers; the Engadin recipe probably spread as bakers went further and further afield in search of work.
P.S. Suisse
221 2nd St #12A
Langley, WA
360-221-9434
Niederegger Eierliqueur Marzipan
Marina Market, $5.50
Although it looks like a typical convenience store from the outside, the Marina Market in downtown Poulsbo is more of a candy convention center. Begun in 1998 with the intent of providing the area's many Scandinavian, Dutch, and European residents with the tastes of home, Marina Market offers a wide range of specialty food, with an emphasis on sweets. The shelves of the "Licorice Shrine" groan under the aggregate weight of nearly 400 different kinds, sourced from all over the world (this selection which may soon earn Marina Market a spot in the Guiness Book of World Records).
The Market also carries a vast stock of old-fashioned and foreign candies and chocolate bars, including a range from Niederegger, a renowned German confectioner in business since the early 19th century. Niederegger is particularly famous for its marzipan, a paste of almonds and sugar that can stand on its own in sculpted sweets, or act as a filling in pastries or bars. Inside the bittersweet chocolate bar above, marzipan is combined with eierliqueur (aka avocaat), a German egg-based liquor.
360 / 779-8430
