Queijada de Sintra

The queijada de Sintra is a shallow, round pastry about 5 centimeters in diameter, handed down in Sintra, Portugal. Inside a crisp, thin shell sits a filling of fresh cheese, eggs, sugar, flour, and cinnamon. This cheese pastry is also popular as an easy-to-carry souvenir, with 6 wrapped together in paper in a long, narrow package.

A Name Derived from Cheese, and a History of Use Even for Paying Rent

The name queijada comes from queijo, the Portuguese word for cheese. Dictionaries define it as a pastry made from a dough of milk, eggs, cheese, sugar, and flour. In other regions, there are also pastries that bear the same name, queijada, but are made without cheese. The combination of a thin shell and fresh cheese is characteristic of Sintra.

In Sintra, records survive of rent and other dues being paid in queijadas between 1227 and 1585. This history shows that the pastry also held value in economic life. Whether the size, the thinness of the shell, and the proportions of sugar and egg at that time were the same as today is not known.

Until around the mid-18th century, queijadas were made at home; after that, production by specialist makers and workshops spread. The year 1756, when Maria Sapa is said to have started working in Ranholas, is one such milestone. She is also said to have made 20 dozen a day.

In the 19th century, production and sales expanded further and were carried on by workshops such as Sapa, Gregório, and Piriquita. In the 20th century, the pastry also won awards at exhibitions and other events. Its role broadened from an item used for payment to a product of specialist artisans and a well-regarded souvenir.

Casa de Sapa, a café serving queijadas, in Sintra in 2005. The names of the pastry and the shop can be seen on the awning out front. Photo: Aldo Ardetti, June 2005, Sintra, Portugal. Original image / CC BY-SA 3.0. Original size, no additional processing.

Rolling Rested Dough Thin and Lining the Molds

The dough for the shell is made mainly from flour and water, sometimes with butter added. In one traditional method, a firm dough is prepared the day before and covered with a dry cloth, with a damp cloth laid over it. The rested dough is rolled out very thinly and cut into circles about 6 centimeters in diameter. Making small cuts around the edge with scissors before fitting each circle into its mold makes it easier for the dough to follow the shallow cup shape.

In a home method that makes the shell from flour and water alone, the dough is kneaded well, rolled out to about 1 millimeter, cut into circles, laid into small buttered molds, and left to dry a little before the filling is added. In either case, this is not a shell that rises high from layers of fat and dough like puff pastry, but one whose thin walls hold the filling and that bakes to a light, crisp bite.

Miolo, the Filling Made with Cheese and Egg Yolks

In Sintra, the filling is called “miolo.” Rather than melting a hard aged cheese, fresh cheese is broken up finely and combined with sugar, egg yolks, a small amount of flour, and cinnamon. Some formulas use unsalted cheese, while other methods use cheese from which the salt has been removed.

In one example of a home recipe (ingredient proportions and method), 500 grams of cheese are combined with 300 grams of sugar, 40 grams of flour, and 4 egg yolks. The cheese, egg yolks, and sugar are mixed well before the flour and cinnamon are added, and the mixture is divided among the molds, taking care not to overfill them, and baked. Once cooled and removed from the molds, the thin shells hold a filling that has set while remaining soft.

Even with the same cheese, sugar, eggs, flour, and cinnamon, the proportions and mixing methods differ from maker to maker. There was also an attempt to set up an organization to coordinate supply so that cheese could be procured reliably. It is a pastry in which the aroma of cinnamon, the flavor of dairy, and the crisp bite of the thin shell can be enjoyed together.

Souvenir Packs of Six, and the Queijada in Literature

The traditional package holds 6. They are arranged in pairs with their wide faces facing each other, with a small piece of paper between them to keep them from sticking. The long, narrow parcel wrapped in paper is also a familiar image of Sintra’s souvenir pastries.

Paper-wrapped queijadas from Sintra also appear in Eça de Queirós’s novel “The Maias.” In the scene, a character goes to greet someone, and at that moment the package comes undone and the pastries tumble onto the floor. The everyday custom of bringing home a local specialty and giving it to others lives on even in a scene of literature.

A Reinterpretation Based on Hirado’s “Kesachiina”

The queijada is also discussed in connection with “kesachiina,” a Japanese nanban confection. In present-day Hirado, new confections made with tart dough and cream cheese are also being created, based on the “kesachiina” that appears in an old illustrated book of confections. It is an attempt that changes the ingredients while making use of the method of enclosing a sweet filling in a shell.

Glossary