Basbousa is an Egyptian classic. It’s a dense semolina yoghurt cake flavoured with brown butter and honey and doused with rose, lemon and cardamom syrup. You’ll find it in every pastry shop in Egypt and it’s often served with cream. But it’s not very easy to find here in the UK, so here’s an easy recipe for you to make your own.
In my youth, when it was rare to know anyone who had travelled abroad, I was a lot more adventurous than I am now. At just eighteen I set off to work in a Swiss hotel in order to learn French, something I hadn’t managed to pick up at school. At various times I hitchhiked from home to France, to Spain and to Switzerland and when I had only just turned seventeen I went to stay with relatives of relatives in Egypt for a month.
Living Abroad
This was long before mobile technology had been invented. Phones were landline only and it was phenomenally expensive to phone overseas. In the first year I was away in Switzerland, I had one phone call with my mother and that was Christmas day.
In Egypt, it was nigh on impossible to phone home. When I went to live there a few years later, the only way of phoning home was to do it through an operator at the post office. It cost a fortune and you had to queue for hours. Writing letters was the only real means of communication and what a slow process that could be. I’m sure my mother would have rested a lot easier in her bed if she had been able to contact me directly and vice versa.
Phone Home
Today things are very different. Life for migrants can be tough. Feelings of homesickness can sometimes be overwhelming and the ability to connect with friends and family can often be a lifesaver. Lebara are specifically set up to help migrants and to connect them to each other and to their friends and family back home.
Lebara Mobile offer a free SIM with low cost international calls, no contract and no hidden charges. To enable migrants to help each other, Lebara to Lebara calls are free. And you don’t have to be coming to or leaving from the UK either, Lebara operates globally. My experiences of living and working abroad would have been very different if I’d had something like this at my disposal.
Part of the founding ethics of Lebara is to give back to the communities that migrants come from. A proportion of the company’s profits go to the Lebara Foundation. This helps displaced communities around the world with housing, health and schooling. You can read about some of the people that have been helped on the Lebara site. This has particular resonance at the moment with the devastating earthquake in Napal which has displaced so many people.
Egyptian Food
I loved Egypt and didn’t feel homesick as I was only there for a short time. But I desperately wanted to communicate the exciting discoveries I was making. Life in Egypt was a very different thing to life back home in Cornwall.
As for the food, it was a revelation and I fell in love with it immediately. It was here I had my first taste of hummus, falafel and shakshuka. Despina, the matriarch of the family I was staying with was probably the best cook I’ve ever come across. We had big sit down feasts of Middle Eastern cuisine every single day.
When it came to Egyptian pastries, I was in heaven: spiced nutty baklawa soaked in rose scented syrup, crumbly crunchy kunafa and the best nougat I’ve ever had anywhere. However, the one I got the most excited about was a plainer less well known cousin, basbousa. This is an Egyptian semolina yogurt cake which is made with brown butter and doused in rose and lemon syrup.
The reason I was so excited was that the pastry shops sold it with a rectangle of what seemed suspiciously like clotted cream. Cornish clotted cream in Egypt? I so wanted to exclaim to my mother the first time I discovered it, but that immediacy was not to be.
Basbousa: Egyptian Semolina Yoghurt Cake
This recipe for basbousa is less sweet than those I used to eat. I just can’t bring myself to apply the copious amounts of sugar stated in all the recipes I looked at. It is, nonetheless, a rather delicious sweet treat. I used kefir rather than yogurt, but this is the closest to the cakes I remember from all those years ago and had the same dense consistency and squiggly top.
The flavours of lemon, rose, honey, cardamom and cloves combine to make a flavour reminiscent of Egypt at it’s best. Of course I had to have a slice topped with a dollop of Cornish clotted cream – for old times sake.
Cut the basbousa into squares or diamonds. Whichever way you cut it, an almond placed on the top makes all the difference. Not only do they look good, but who doesn’t adore a delectable roasted almond? I used some of the blanched marcona almonds I received from 3pFruits.
Other Semolina Cakes You Might Like
- Honey and walnut yoghurt semolina cake via Tin and Thyme
- Marmalade coconut semolina cake via Recipes from a Pantry
- Orange and semolina cake via Of Cloves and Capers
- Olive oil, orange and oregano cake via Fuss Free Flavours
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you make this Egyptian semolina and yoghurt cake, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. And do please rate the recipe. Have you any top tips? Do share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
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If you’d like more Middle Eastern inspired recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious, of course.
Choclette x
Basbousa. PIN IT.
Basbousa – The Recipe
Basbousa – Egyptian Semolina Yoghurt Cake
Ingredients
Cake
- 75 g unsalted butter
- 150 g semolina
- 1 tbsp honey
- 250 g natural yoghurt (I used kefir)
- 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
- 12 blanched almonds
Syrup
- 200 g water
- 100 g sugar
- 1 tsp honey
- 2 cardamom pods
- 1 whole clove
- ½ lemon juiced
- 2 drops rose extract (I used Lama Spice Drops)
Instructions
Cake
- Simmer the butter in a large pan for a few minutes until it starts to turn brown (be careful not to actually burn it).75 g unsalted butter
- Add the semolina and continue to cook over a low heat, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes.150 g semolina
- Stir in the honey.1 tbsp honey
- Remove from the heat and stir in the yoghurt, followed by the bicarbonate of soda.250 g natural yoghurt, 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
- Pour into an 8″ (20 cm) sq silicone mould (or lined tin) and leave for an hour or more to firm up.
- Cut into diamonds and place an almond on the top of each piece.12 blanched almonds
- Bake at 180℃ (350℉, Gas 4) for about 30 minutes, when the top should be nicely brown, but not burnt.
Syrup
- Whilst the cake is resting, dissolve the sugar and honey in the water over a low heat.200 g water, 100 g sugar, 1 tsp honey
- Add the cardamom and clove and simmer for about 10-15 minutes or until the syrup has thickened.2 cardamom pods, 1 whole clove
- Remove from the heat and allow to cool a little.
- Add the lemon and rose extract and pour over the hot cake.½ lemon, 2 drops rose extract
- Leave in the mould to cool and the cake will soak up all of the syrup.
Notes
Nutrition Estimate
This is a sponsored post. I was not expected to write a positive review and all opinions are, as always, my own. Thank you for supporting the brands and organisations that help to keep Tin and Thyme blithe and blogging.
Dom says
ahhh, the glamour of international travel!… I had to explain to someone (younger than me) what inter-railing was the other day. Love these treats but then anything with this amount of honey is OK by me!
Choclette says
Ah yes inter-railing – the upmarket version of hitchhiking 😉 When did that stop? Honey just makes everything better.
Rhizowen says
That looks mighty moreish to me.
Choclette says
Moorish or moreish Rhizowen. Moorish seems quite appropriate here too 😉
Camilla says
Fabulous cake which I’ve not heard of before but now I have Kate Bush’s Babouska going around my head!
Choclette says
Haha Camilla, I’m going to be bursting into song every time I say basbousa from now on in.
Margot @ Coffee & Vanilla says
Lovely recipe and that is true, Lebara is worth knowing about, saved me lots of money when I needed to call my mum daily in Poland for the last couple of years.
Choclette says
Thanks Margot, it’s good to hear real testimonials 🙂
Sarah, Maison Cupcake says
I have enjoyed similar cakes to this from the Lebanese shop I had at the end of the street in West London. They’re delightfully sweet and sticky!
Choclette says
Haha Sarah, yes they can be. Mine is deliberately not too sweet and surprisingly not that sticky given the amount of syrup I poured over it.
Angie@Angie's Recipes says
Basbousa…what an artistic name for a simple sweet treat. The cardamom syrup sounds really intriguing.
Choclette says
Thanks Angie. Basbousa is a great name to say – love it. And the syrup is much more complex than the average and consequently rather good.
Lou Foti says
For years I’ve had a Lebara card, to phone family and friends in Europe. AMAZING value and charges are barely more, if not less, than phoning UK mobiles! Gorgeous recipe too by the way!
Choclette says
Thanks Lou, it’s good to hear from someone who uses Lebara and I’m really pleased to have found out about it.
Beth @ BethinaBox.com says
Oooh, that Basbousa sounds lovely… I’m not very adventurous with puddings but may have to send this to my Mum for her to try out!
I would have loved to have lived abroad, but in the grand scheme of things I am a homebird and now I have no desire to even holiday abroad.
Choclette says
Haha, I know what you mean Beth. We always go on holiday in Cornwall these days – not even leaving the county. How unadventurous can you get?
Hannah says
I’ve never seen that cake before, that recipe looks nice and easy to make x
Choclette says
It’s a very easy cake to make Hannah – always a big plus.
Janice says
oh and great cake too, of course that is a given 😉
Choclette says
Thank you Janice
Janice says
oh for those days of freedom and adventure! It all seems much more complicated now, but I do agree about the phone calls, you just didn’t call abroad unless it was an emergency. It sounds like Lebara has made things a lot easier.
Choclette says
Yes Janice, “those were the days my friend, I thought they’d never end …” 😉
Janie says
My biggest regret in terms of travelling in my 20’s pre current technology, is losing touch with all the people I met along the way. Nowadays you’d just look them up on Facebook and be able to stay in touch 🙂
Janie x
Choclette says
That is so true Janie. I’ve lost touch with just about everyone too and it would be fabulous to find out how they all are and what they got up to.
Vaishali Sengupta says
The basbousa sounds really exciting. Am sure the yoghurt must make it really moist and delightful. Will certainly try it out 🙂
Choclette says
Thanks Vaishali, it’s very different from a sponge cake, but really good in its own right.
Bintu @ Recipes From A Pantry says
I love hearing about different people experiences of moving to the UK and I would have loved to meet Despina and learnt some recipes from her. Luckily nowadays it is easy to call home or our Despinas via Lebara.
Choclette says
Thanks Bintu, communication is so much easier now thanks to the likes of Lebara.
Kath says
I like this post and hearing about your adventures very much. How brave you were. I wouldn’t have been that brave. The basbousa sounds like something I would like very much.
Choclette says
Ah, thanks Kath. I don’t think I’d be as brave today, despite the wonders of mobile technology.