Part of my Austro Hungarian background, kaiserschmarren or better known in Hungary as smarni, the official Hungarian name of course is császár morzsa or emperor crumbs. The names vary but the method of preparation seems endless. It’s a quick [sweet] fix when the fridge and pantry are sparsely stocked. Its peasant food and an emperor’s favourite. The main ingredient is flour or farina. You can cook it in a fry pan or bake it the oven. You can put raisins in it or not. I prefer the flour-oven method with the raisins. One thing is certain. In either of its form, smarni is best eaten hot, right out of the oven with jam and a sprinkling of icing sugar. And you don’t want to eat a lot of it. The recipe here will feed 4 people.
SMARNI
1 cup flour1/4 cup icing sugar
sprinkling of salt
2 yolks
1 cup milk
1/8 cup butter, divided
1/4 cup raisins
grated rind of 1/2 a lemon
2 egg whites
jam
icing sugar for sprinkling
• Preheat the oven to 375F.
• Combine the flour, icing sugar and sprinkling of salt,
• In a medium sized bowl whisk the egg yolks. Add the milk and whisk to combine.
• Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture and stir to combine.
• Melt half of the 1/8 cup of butter and add to the batter.
• Stir in the raisins and the lemon rinds.
• In a separate bowl beat the egg whites until hard peaks form.
• Gently fold the beaten egg whites into the batter.
• Butter a baking pan with the remaining butter.
• Place the batter in the pan and bake it until nicely browned.
• Remove pan from the oven and cut the cake into irregular shapes with a spatula.
• Serve immediately with jam and a sprinkling of icing sugar.
