Basboussa

This is an Egyptian sweet semolina cake. There are so many versions of this cake. Some use only semolina and some use flour and semolina in various proportions. There are also recipes using egg. This is an eggless recipe. The preparation is quite easy and interesting. Sugar syrup is poured on the baked cake to make it soft.
After seeing the amount of syrup, I was afraid that I will end up with a sticky cake. But to my astonishment, the cake absorbed all the syrup and it was very soft and not sticky.
I first saw the preparation in Fox History-Egyptian Food Safari. From that day, I was tempted to prepare it. I searched for a recipe in you tube and I came across this one. Today I collected all the ingredients and prepared this delicious and soft cake. Hubby liked it a lot.

Ingredients:
For The Cake:
Fine Semolina-2 1/2cups
Flour-1/2cup
Baking Powder-1 1/2tbs
Grated Coconut-1/2cup
Melted Butter-1cup
Rose Essence-1tsp
Curd-125gm
Sugar-100gm
Pistas-20-25nos
For The Syrup:
Sugar-1 1/2cups
Water-1cup
Rose Essence-1tsp

Procedure:
1. Mix flour, semolina, baking powder, sugar and coconut.
2. Mix rose essence and curd.
3. Add butter to the semolina mixture and mix well.
4. Add the curd and bring everything together.
5. Grease a 8"cake tin and place the dough inside.
6. Press it to level the surface.
7. Cut it into diamonds with a knife.
8. Place a pista in each diamond.
9. Preheat oven to 150C.
10. Bake for 40minutes or until the top is golden brown.
11. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, combine sugar,water and rose essence and bring it to boil.
12. Simmer and let the syrup boil for 5minutes.
13. Pour the hot syrup on the hot cake and set it aside.
14. The cake will slowly absorb the syrup and when cool, the surface will be dry to touch.
15. Cut along the lines. Remove from pan and serve.

Photo Tutorial: