Lebanese Danish Pastry!

Our bringer of cake for today hails from the Middle Eastern. In the past we have seen specialties from that area including some very good baklava goodies.  So imagine our surprise when he shows up with a tray of Danish pastries - the American kind.  This was actually a first in that we could not remember a time that we ever had Danish pastries at cake hour. Did you know Danish pastry, actually, originated in Vienna. And in Denmark it is referred to as Vienna Bread. For some reason the Danes had to import some bakers form Austria who started baking what they knew and ended up creating a new type of treat.  Danish pastries are now all over the world. So let's give them a try!

I may not be Danish but...

Stacked two high!

Cheese filling.....

.....and raspberry!

Lemon Danish..not seen too often!

Today's premier Danish were brought in a tray that contained four different kinds - cheese danish, raspberry danish, lemon danish and apple cinnamon danish.  Although they look pretty thick on the tray in fact they are stacked two high so each pastry is not as caloric as it at first looks.  Everything was as expected. There was the very moist pastry portion, the central filling and then the powdered sugar syrup icing drizzled across the top.  Classic! Inasmuch that some danish pastries can be very dry and doughy these were a pleasant surprise.  The fillings were pretty commercial but it was expected.  The apple seemed to be the most popular but the others were also tasty which is not bad considering this is a very commercial product. We don't suspect a local baker got up at 4am to make the dough and bake these. Nevertheless we appreciated them. Thanks to our Lebanese friend for the Viennese inspired Danish treat.

And apple! This one was the big hit!

Today the students returned from their really long semester break. Five weeks! Do they think they are in Europe or something. Needless to say a few faces returned to the lab and cake hour.

Thumbs up for cake, again!