Anyone who’s spent more than one festive season in South Africa knows that certain desserts are bound to make their way to the table every year.
From malva pudding to ice cream cake, here’s a list of five desserts South Africans can’t get enough of at the end of the year:
Malva Pudding
Picture this: a pudding with a spongy interior and a caramelised exterior covered in hot custard. Now stop imagining and get yourself to a friend or relative’s dinner table. While the origins of this dessert are sometimes disputed, its tastiness has never been up for debate.
Although South Africans have always had a soft spot for this festive treat, it seems the rest of the world didn’t catch on until 2006, when Art Smith (Oprah Winfrey’s former personal chef) prepared it for Christmas dinner.
Ice Cream Cake
If you draw up a list of people’s favourite sweet treats, ice cream and cake are probably going to be mentioned more than once. So it was really only a matter of time before someone decided to combine the two.
This dessert is especially popular with people who can’t bear the thought of being served fruit cake once again on Christmas. If there was ever an easy way to put a spin on the traditional festive season menu, it’s by serving loads of ice cream cake.
Trifle
Although trifle is an English dessert, you’ll have a hard time finding a South African who hasn’t sunk their teeth into it during the festive season. Its popularity probably has a lot to do with how easy it is to prepare: all you need to make this no-bake dessert is a fruit, custard and cake.
The fruit you use can vary from tinned peaches to fresh mangos, and the same goes for the cake. While most recipes use sponge rolls, any kind of sponge cake, vanilla cake or Madeira cake will work just as well.
Swiss Roll
Despite the name, no one really knows where the Swiss roll comes from. Most food historians think it originated in Central Europe, but none of that really matters when this fluffy dessert is in front of you.
For something that looks and tastes so impressive, this iconic South African dessert is surprisingly simple to make. Most Swiss roll recipes have no more than five ingredients and require little to no baking experience.
Fruit Mince Pies
If you’ve never had a fruit mince pie during the festive season, you’re definitely in the minority. The good news is that it’s neither too late nor too hard to get your hands on this festive treat. Although the recipes differ from kitchen to kitchen, fruit mince pies are usually a sweet and sour mix of dried fruit and aromatic spices.
Homemade pies can be frozen for as long as three months, so there’s no need to worry about what to do with the leftovers.
Meringue
The phrase “melt-in-your-mouth” is thrown around a lot, but it’s the only way to describe this dessert. Meringues can be eaten like biscuits or used as the basis for desserts including macarons and lemon meringue pie.
They can also be sculpted into a shape of your choice, which makes it easy for them to double up as edible Christmas embellishments.
Surprises are good, but sometimes all you want is the sweet familiarity of a dessert you’ve enjoyed for years. If that’s the case, there are more than enough sugary staples you can look forward to enjoying this festive season.
