Shekerbura

Shekerbura (Şəkərbura) is an Azerbaijani pastry made by wrapping a filling of finely ground nuts and sugar in a soft dough, folding it into a half-moon shape and baking it. Fine patterns are made on the surface with a special tool, and the edge is sealed by twisting it with the fingers. Pakhlava is made by soaking cut layers in syrup. Shekerbura, by contrast, is made by wrapping the filling in each piece individually.

For Novruz in spring, relatives and neighbors gather to make this pastry and other festive foods. Many people take part in shaping each piece by hand, and the time spent making them together is itself part of the celebration.

A dough suited to decoration, and a nut filling

Some recipes (the ingredient proportions and method) for the dough use wheat flour, butter, egg yolks, sour cream, milk and other ingredients. The aim is not for the dough to rise substantially like bread. Instead, it needs to be soft enough to wrap the filling and to take decoration on its surface.

Some versions use a small amount of yeast. In one example on Azerbaijan’s official tourism website, 0.5 teaspoon of dry yeast is used per 1 kilogram of flour.

In this example, the flour and butter are first mixed by hand. The egg yolks and sour cream, combined separately, and the yeast dissolved in milk are then added. The dough is brought together, rested for about 30 minutes and then divided into small pieces. The fat is worked into the flour first, and the liquids are added afterward.

For the filling, skinned hazelnuts, almonds or walnuts are ground, mixed with sugar and flavored with cardamom or other spices. The recipe on Azerbaijan’s official tourism website combines 700 grams of nuts with 700 grams of sugar. This example uses equal weights of nuts and sugar, but proportions vary from household to household, and this is not a required ratio shared by every version.

This filling is made differently from cream fillings cooked with a large amount of milk. Ground nuts and sugar are mixed, and portions small enough to wrap in the half-moon of dough are taken out and used. The type of nut also changes the aroma and the flavor when bitten into.

Twisting the edge and patterning the surface are separate tasks

The dough is rolled out into a round, the filling is placed in the center, and the dough is folded in half. The seam is pinched between the thumb and index finger and sealed with small, successive twists. Twisting the edge closed gives the half-moon a neat outline.

For the surface, a tweezer-like tool called a maggash is used. The dough is pinched little by little to create rows of fine patterns. Sealing the edge serves to enclose the filling, while pinching the surface is for decoration; both are handwork, but their roles differ. The patterns are made in the soft dough before baking, and baking preserves their shape.

In some versions, the pastry is not browned too strongly, and only the bottom and edges take on a light color. The tourism website’s recipe gives 175°C for 15–20 minutes as a guide, but the result also varies with the oven and the size of the pieces. On lightly colored dough, the shadows created by the relief of the decoration stand out clearly.

Shekerbura with patterned surfaces, arranged with green sprouts. Photo: Sefer azeri, 2021-05-01, location unknown. Original image / CC BY-SA 4.0. Original size, no further processing.

Made together and placed on the khoncha

When preparing for Novruz, relatives and neighbors gather at one home and divide up the tasks: dividing the dough, rolling it out, placing the filling, sealing the edges and adding the patterns. Because each piece takes time to decorate, the pastry is closely tied to communal work involving many people.

The baked shekerbura are arranged on a festive tray called a khoncha, together with other sweets, nuts, dried fruit, colored eggs and other foods. In the description of the celebration by the National Commission of the Republic of Azerbaijan for UNESCO, the half-moon of shekerbura represents the moon, the round goghal represents the sun, and pakhlava represents the four corners of the world. These three different shapes are set out together on the festive tray. Some goghal have a savory spiced filling, so their role in terms of flavor also differs from that of the sweet, nut-filled shekerbura.

Pakhlava, made by stacking layers, and shekerbura, made by wrapping filling in thin dough one piece at a time and decorating it, are both festive sweets made with nuts and sugar. They differ not only in shape but also in the handwork used to form them. The fine patterns of shekerbura are tied to festive preparations shared among family and neighbors.

Azerbaijani sweets: shekerbura (center of the left plate) arranged with goghal and pakhlava. Photo: Khadija1215, 2024-12-20, Azerbaijan. Original image / CC BY-SA 4.0. Reduced-size version from the source, no further processing.

A name linked to sugar and to the motion of twisting the edge

The element şəkər in the name shekerbura means sugar. The second half of the name relates to the forms şəkərbure and şəkərburək found in Persian sources. The linguist Günel Orucova treats these two forms as words that combine Persian and Turkic elements, and she links the second half to burmaq, meaning “to twist.”

This etymological explanation corresponds to the twisting of the pastry’s edge. The Azerbaijani explanatory dictionary describes shekerbura as a pastry with a filling of nuts and sugar, an edge twisted in a spiral and a pattern on top. The pastry is not simply folded into a half-moon. Twisting the filled edge and decorating the surface are also features that distinguish the pastry bearing this name.

Glossary