User:7272 Paolla Zachert/Cuca (Cake)

“Cuca” is a sheet cake made out of eggs, wheat flour, butter and covered with sugar. The “Cuca” cake is very similar to the Streuselkuchen, which is a type of cake that is traditional from German Coisine.

Between them the biggest difference is that the original Brazilian “Cuca” does not have a Streusel cover as the Streuselkuchen does, it is covered with only sugar.

This characteristic sugar cover from the original Brazilian recipe appears in various encyclopaedic dictionaries (e.g., Encyclopaedic Dictionary Koogan Larousse) on which its definition is exposed.

As it’s known, the name “Cuca” comes from a Portuguese phonetic of the term “cooker” in english.

Streuselkuchen comes from the german culinary and was brought to the south of Brazil from german immigrants. Streuselkuchen  is called by a different name is the south of Brazil ,on the other hand, the name “Cuca” cake is called by its original name in every part of the country.

The term “Cuca” is also used in the south of Brazil to designate sheet cakes and pastries, which are made according to original german recipes (Blechkuchen), usually cooked or baked straight from a baking sheet (Backbech), with no mold (Backform). [2]

These cakes and pastries are mostly divided in pieces, on which the base is made from a pastry with a sandy mass consistency, heavy mass consistency or a soft consistency, except the puff pastry.

After the puff pastry is cooked  it gets very hard to cut it, that is why those type of pastry are cut before it’s cooked.

Multiple coverages are also common, for example the Streuselkuchen with cherries.

A filling can be added after (Bienenstrich). These type of coverage can be done individually or mixed with something else, for example Streusel, fruit or creams.

The typical sheet cakes and pastries, according to german recipes, are butter cakes (Butterkuchen), Streusel cake (Streuselkuchen), bee sting cake (Bienenstich), egg pie (Eierschecke), german plum pie (Zwetschgenkuchen), onion tart (Zwiebelkuchen).

Below are some examples of german types of pies and cakes:

Cakes or pastries are, generally, the ones baked in circular and shallow molds, among these we encounter the sheet cakes (Blechkuchen).

History
Origins of the term "Cuca".

The vocabulary "Cuca" is used inappropriately in certain states of Southern Brazil. It is used as if it is a synonym of the german Streuselkuchen. The term "Cuca" comes from the Portuguese phonetic of the english word "cooker". Therefore, it is impossible that the word has originated from kutchen, that composes Streuselkuchen, that has never been translated to Portuguese.

The Master-Cooker

The vocabulary "Cuca" phonetically originated from the term "cooker", that word also introduced Brazilians to the term Master-Cooker (mestre-cuca).

In the 19th century, this term was used to designate the baking area in an oven, which was very common, especially in restaurants.

The term "Master-Cooker", in Brazil, has lost its original meaning and is popularly used to designate a chef.

The "Cuca" cake is a sheet cake (Blechkuchen), on which the Streuselkuchen is also included. Germans and their Brazilian descendants called by the name "Cuca" not only Streuselkuchen, but all sheet cakes, even the ones not covered in Streusel.

As it's known, the sheet cake is not cooked or baked in a mold, but straight on the sheet plate, on which the cake base is stretched and only then baked.

Considering this sui generis use, it already makes sense to call it "Cuca Cake" or simply "Cuca", because the use of that word means baked cake or a cake baked directly on the plate of the charcoal stove, which popularly known in the 19th century as simply Cuca (cooker [k ' ukə]).