Gata

Gata (գաթա) is a baked pastry handed down in Armenia. Some gata are large discs cut into portions, while others are made by rolling up dough and cutting it into small pieces. A filling called khoriz, which combines flour, fat and sugar, is well known. Wheat flour is used not only for the outer crust but also for the filling inside. The same flour and butter are kneaded together in the dough and crumbled finely in the filling.

In a 1960 cookbook, the filling of Leninakan gata contains no sugar, while the filling of Yerevan gata contains powdered sugar. The fermentation method and the order in which the filling is rolled in also differ in each recipe (the ingredient proportions and method) named after a region, and these differences change the layers seen in the cut surface and the sweetness.

In Yerevan gata, the layers of dough are made first

The cookbook “Armenian Cuisine,” published in Moscow in 1960, includes gata under regional names. For its Yerevan gata, a yeasted dough is made by the straight-dough method. In the straight-dough method, the dough is made without fermenting a separate sponge.

This dough is rolled out to a thickness of 1.5–2 millimeters, brushed with melted butter and folded in half. Rolling it out again and brushing it with butter is repeated 4–5 times, after which the dough is rolled into a log and cut. Each cut piece is rolled out into a round, and only then is the khoriz wrapped inside. The filling is made by rubbing clarified butter into wheat flour, adding powdered sugar and crumbling the mixture finely.

The shaped gata are placed seam side down, brushed with egg yolk, pricked with a fork and baked. The finished thickness is 1.5–2 centimeters. The structure consists of a layered crust enclosing the filling gathered in the center. In addition to the clarified butter used in the filling, the formula also includes butter for the layering. Three uses of fat overlap in a single gata: fat mixed into the dough, fat that creates the layers and fat in the filling.

The same book’s Leninakan gata is made by the same procedure as the Yerevan gata, but no sugar is added to the filling. The filling consists of wheat flour, clarified butter and salt. The powdered sugar of the sweet khoriz is omitted, and a filling of flour and fat is wrapped in the dough and baked. This version, recorded under Leninakan, the regional name in use at the time, is also counted as a type of gata.

Dough made with a sponge, and dough rolled up with the filling

Stepanavan gata uses a sponge. A sponge is made by first combining part of the flour, the yeast and part of the water and letting the mixture ferment. The remaining ingredients are then added to make the final dough. This version uses milk, eggs, butter and sugar, so the dough of the crust itself is also sweet.

The rolled-out dough is brushed with melted butter, folded over like an envelope and brushed with more butter, and then the filling is placed on it. The dough is drawn in from all four sides to enclose the filling, turned over and rolled out to an even thickness. In this sequence, the folded dough wraps a single mass of filling. In addition to powdered sugar, the filling is flavored with lemon zest or vanilla.

Kirovakan gata, which also uses a sponge, is made by rolling the dough out to about 5 millimeters, brushing it with butter and spreading the filling over it to a thickness of 2–3 millimeters. The dough is then rolled into a log and cut, and each piece is pinched closed at both ends and rolled out into a round. Finally, the edge is pinched up to form a low rim.

Because the surface spread with filling is rolled inward in Kirovakan gata, the dough and filling are shaped into a disc while layered together. Yerevan gata wraps the filling afterward in dough that has already been layered with fat, whereas Kirovakan gata rolls the filling in with the dough before reshaping it. Both are baked as rounds, but they differ in the steps that determine where the filling is placed.

The same book’s Artsakh gata also uses a sponge, and butter, sugar and eggs are added to the final dough. The dough is rolled out into a round and brushed with butter, the filling is placed on it, and the edges are gathered to close it. In this version, the filling is wrapped without repeated folding or rolling, and 200 grams of filling is used for every 250 grams of dough. Each regional recipe combines the fermentation method, the sweetness of the crust, the amount of filling and the order of wrapping in its own way.

A name preserved in a medieval fable

The etymology of gata has not been established. Hasmik Hmayakyan, who studied the name, cites the fable “The Pig and the Gata” by the medieval preacher Vardan Aygektsi as an early example of its use. In the story, a pig eating gata raises its head, spilling the filling, and looks at the disc of the sun; both the pastry and its filling appear in the text. When the pastry was first made is unknown.

The linguist Gevorg Jahukyan regards the similarity in sound to the French word gâteau, meaning cake, as a coincidence. Hmayakyan also proposes a connection with a Hittite word for bread, but the composition of that food is not known, and this idea is presented as an etymological hypothesis.

Stamping patterns and inviting guests to weddings

Traditionally, gata has been baked in an earthen oven called a tonir. When gata was made communally in villages, neighboring women joined the women of the household to knead the dough and fire the oven. For surface decoration, besides cuts and dough ornaments, a stamp called a gatanakhshich is also used to press in patterns. The gatanakhshich is a wooden stamp that presses shapes such as the sun or the moon into the soft dough, leaving a pattern before baking.

Gata was also a food given as a gift at weddings. The t‘el-gat‘a made in New Nakhichevan had khoriz inside thin layers of greased dough and was patterned with a thin wooden rolling pin. A few days before a wedding, older women among the relatives and neighbors gathered to bake them. On the eve of the wedding, young relatives rode on horseback from house to house, handing out one each to deliver the invitation.

In Javakhk, gathering to bake was itself a ritual. People brought butter, eggs and milk and gathered at the house of the groom-to-be. Flour was sifted with lights and music, the close relatives who stayed behind baked a large number of gata, and each person took one home when leaving. Gata was not only placed on the festive table. It was a pastry for which people brought ingredients, baked together, and carried as invitations and gifts.

Mijink, discussed by Hmayakyan, is the day that falls in the middle of Lent. Customs on this day included putting beads, rings, coins and similar items into gata or a bread called balarj to tell fortunes. The gata and bread were said to be shared not only with the family but also with livestock and the land, and this sharing carried wishes for the household’s livelihood in the year ahead.

One roadside gata, and Khachik in autumn

Today, gata is also an everyday pastry eaten with tea or coffee. Around Garni and Geghard, large round gata are well known. At Geghard, gata with patterns or place names on the surface are sold along the road leading to the monastery.

In the village of Khachik in Vayots Dzor Province, a festival celebrating gata is held in autumn. Village bakers bake large gata and share them with visitors, and singing, dancing and a crafts market are also part of the event. The custom of making gata together and giving it to others continues in an event that welcomes visitors to the village.

Methods of making gata have also been passed on to households abroad. Anushka Zargaryan, an Armenian cook in Australia, presents a dough that combines yogurt, eggs, butter, wheat flour, salt and baking soda. Another method spreads a filling of toasted flour, walnuts, sugar and plant-based fat over store-bought pastry dough, which is then rolled up into a butterfly shape. Whether made with dough kneaded at home or with store-bought pastry dough, gata with a flour filling is baked with ingredients suited to the place where it is made.

Victoria, a food writer whose family has roots in Yerevan, presents a gata made with sour cream that she learned from her aunt. Sour cream is cream with a sour taste produced by lactic fermentation. For this dough, butter is mixed into the flour, and the dough is then folded and refrigerated overnight. The next day, a fine filling of flour, butter, sugar and vanilla is spread over it, and the dough is rolled up, flattened slightly, brushed with egg and cut. Unlike laminated pastry, in which a separate block of butter is enclosed, this family method creates layers through the fat mixed into the dough and the folding.

Glossary