Each day brings us bits of knowledge, browsing through my dessert cookbooks, I learned thanks to Austrian Desserts and Pastries (Skyhorse Publishing, 2011) that 'strudel' and 'croustade' are immigrants.
"It's practically the Austrian national dish, but like much of what became part of Viennese cuisine, strudel is also an "immigrant," and quite the well-traveled one at that: The Arabs were the first to practice the art of stretching out paper-thin sheets of dough, filling them with rose jelly or orange syrup, and baking them. Nor did they want to miss out on this tender delicacy when out conquering. Whether in northern Africa, Spain, or western Africa, wherever the Arabs advanced, strudel went native. In antique cookbooks, you can still find strudel dough under the name "Spanish dough." However, the Moors of Spain did not roll up the strudel dough, but rather laid alternating layers of dough and filling atop one another.
Baklava, originating from Turkey and extremely popular in the Balkans, is prepared according to this principle as well.
The paper-thin pastry sheets accompanied the Arabs' triumphal entrance into France. When the Arabs returned to their homeland after their defeat at the Battle of Poitiers, the liberated countries retained the skill of baking strudel, but it did not spread any farther.
The strudel was preserved as "Pastis" or "Croustade" and potentially could even have been assimilated into the Austrian cuisine along with many other French specialties. As a matter of fact though, it was brought by the Turks. They advanced via the Balkans to Hungary and Vienna, and in their field kitchens wreaths of aromatic strudel could be found, which stayed on after the siege of Vienna as a gift from the Orient. Hungary, where strudel is known as "retes," must have been quite the special stopover. For here an especially sticky flour could be found that made the dough very malleable. Thus western Hungary (present-day Burgenland), Vienna, and Lower Austria were the first areas where strudel became widespread. Here you can also find the greatest variety of fillings. In Vienna it is said that a conscientious strudel baker stretches out the dough so thin that she can read her love letters through it. This led to the saying that the best strudel is baked by a cook who is in love. Today of course you can buy strudel dough ready-made, a true delight. But if you ever bake strudel for someone you're especially fond of, you should try making the strudel dough yourself for a change so that you can pour out your heart not just into the filling, but also into the whisper-thin sleeve. Packing filling into strudel dough is the most natural thing in the world to us today. It's a brilliant concept! In this fashion, the juice from the fruit or other ingredients can't leak (provided of course the strudel is made correctly). The preservation of the juice keeps things moist during the baking process and in the finished strudel as well."
(* Excerpt and photo from Austrian Desserts and Pastries by Dietmar Fercher and Andrea Karrer- Skyhorse Publishing- Fall 2011- All rights reserved)
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