Ovos Moles

Ovos moles are a sweet made in Aveiro, Portugal, with egg yolks and sugar as the main ingredients. The name means “soft eggs.” Breaking the white shell-shaped wafer reveals an egg cream ranging from deep yellow to orange. Some are wrapped in thin wafers shaped like fish, shells or barrels, while others are packed into small wooden or porcelain barrels and scooped out to eat. No milk or butter is used; the softness comes from egg yolks and reduced sugar syrup.

Cooling the Syrup, Adding the Yolks and Heating Again

The yolks are carefully separated from the whites, and the sugar and water are boiled down in a separate pan. Once the syrup has reached the specified concentration, it is cooled before the yolks are added, and the mixture is heated again. The wooden spoon is moved back and forth rather than in circles, and the mixture is worked until it is thick enough for the bottom of the pan to show. By adjusting how the syrup is reduced and how the mixture is heated after the yolks are added, a smooth cream is achieved with no sugar crystals or grains of set egg left in it. Product descriptions note that a few days after making, the sugar may crystallize and small grains may appear. The even texture when freshly cooked and changes that can occur during storage are separate matters.

Cooling after heating is also essential. It is needed to achieve both enough body to stay within the shape and a creamy softness that spreads on the tongue. Traditionally, the cream is rested for about 24 hours in a place where temperature and humidity are controlled and where it cannot take on odors from other foods. In a method where the cooked yolk-and-sugar filling is transferred to a blast chiller, cooled to 15–18°C and then allowed to settle again, the overnight resting step can be omitted. What goes into the wafers is filling that has cooled thoroughly and settled.

Thin White Wafers Shaped Like Fish, Shells and Nuts

Hóstia is a thin wafer with hollows, made from flour, water and vegetable fat. The cooled cream is placed in it, the top and bottom are stuck together and pressed, and the edges are trimmed straight with scissors or a similar tool. Rather than being baked like a cake after filling, they are dried as needed. Absorbing moisture from the filling, the wafer becomes pliable, melts away in the mouth and blends with the yolk cream.

Besides fish and shells, the shapes include walnuts, chestnuts, acorns and baskets. They represent the lagoon, where fishing and salt making are carried out, along with the trees and ways of life around it. Some keep the white wafer as it is, while others are brushed with syrup and dried to give a more opaque white.

Ovos moles with the wafer broken open, showing the deep yellow egg filling. Photo: Hridel, 2011-05-14, location unknown. Original image / CC BY 3.0. Full size, no additional processing.

Chocolate-Coated Sweets and Sales in Cigar Boxes

Those coated in chocolate are called “ovos moles pretos.” According to the recollections of the confectioner Silvina Raimundo, included in a 2015 EU application to amend the specification, she took orders for festivals and coated each one in chocolate by hand to make gifts. Rosalina Jesus recalls packing six cigar-shaped pieces into empty cigar boxes and selling them. According to the application, a 1928 confectionery book also contains an illustration of chocolate-coated ones.

The protected geographical indication (IGP) name “Ovos Moles de Aveiro” was registered in 2009. An amendment adding the chocolate-coated ones to the scope of protection was applied for in 2013 and approved in September 2015. The period when the sweet itself was made differs from the time when it was accepted in the specification for the certified product. There is also an account that it ceased during the Second World War, but the year and circumstances of the interruption are not clear.

Small Wooden and Porcelain Barrels Decorated with Paintings

Only the filling is placed into the small wooden or porcelain barrels, using a spatula or a piping bag. The wooden barrels are painted with moliceiro boats crossing the lagoon, salt pans and lighthouses. The porcelain barrels have blue decoration on a white ground. Barrels also appear in 19th-century lithographs of women vendors, and in the early 20th century they changed from being assembled from staves to being turned from wood. The making of the containers is also part of the history of this local specialty.

From Convent Confectionery to a Specialty of the Town and Its Station

Behind the confectionery tradition centered on the Convent of Jesus, a Dominican convent for women in Aveiro, lie the eggs delivered from the local land and sugar from the island of Madeira granted by the Crown. Women who learned there are said to have passed the methods on to the town, and confectionery that makes generous use of egg yolks and sugar was carried on in homes and pastry shops.

Cloistered life, which restricted contact with the outside world, continued until 1874, when the last nun died. In 1882 the building passed to the Dominican Third Order and became the Santa Joana school. In 1910 that community was dissolved, and in the following year, 1911, a museum was established there. Meanwhile, the sweet became a local specialty that was also sold to travelers at the station. Small barrels from Aveiro also appear in Eça de Queirós’s novel “The Maias.” Both the kind scooped from small barrels and the bite-sized shell shapes became travel sweets that could be bought at the station. The method of cooking egg yolks over heat and the designs depicting life on the lagoon have been passed down.

Glossary