FRIED CAKES 
Free-Form Honey Cake (Mahalkra or Shebbakia) 
This is one of the famous honey cakes served with spicy harira soup for Ramadan, but it is also good on the dessert tray with other cookies for afternoon tea. These cakes are very sweet-when you bite into mahalkra you are biting into pure honey. 
This somewhat difficult recipe has been vastly scaled down in consideration of American tastes. In a Moroccan home it wouldn't make sense to make less than five hundred cakes. Friends and neighbors help, and then everyone goes home with a large batch. Ramadan lasts a whole month, and the culinary frenzy at sundown is truly incredible. 

INGREDIENTS 
1 Y2 cups plus 1 tablespoon sweet butter 
1 package active dry yeast or Y2 package baker's yeast 
3 large eggs 
% teaspoon salt 
Y2 teaspoon double-acting baking powder 2 to 3 tablespoons orange flower water 
1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
2Y2 tablespoons white vinegar 
2 pounds all-purpose flour 
Pinch of pulverized saffron 
Salad oil for deep frying 
5 cups dark honey 
Y3 cup sesame seeds, oven toasted 

EQUIPMENT 
Small and large saucepans Large and small bowls Whisk 
Rolling pin 
Serrated pastry wheel 2 baking sheets Large, deep saucepan Tongs 
Colander 
Working and frying time: 2 hours 
Makes: 35 cakes, approximately 

	FREE-FORM HONEY CAKE 	303 

1. Melt and cool the 1 Yz cups butter. Sprinkle the yeast over ~ cup lukewarm water, stir to dissolve, and set in a warm place until bubbly. 
2. In a mixing bowl beat the eggs with the salt, baking powder, orange flower water, and vanilla. Then add the vinegar and melted butter. 
3. Place the flour in large mixing bowl and make a well in the center. Slowly pour the egg mixture into the flour, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon until well combined. Then add the bubbling yeast. Work into a stiff dough, adding only as much water as you need. Knead well by pressing down and pushing forward with the heel of your hand and folding the dough over onto itself. Knead until smooth and elastic. 
4. Blend 1 tablespoon butter with the pulverized saffron until bright yellow. Then blend into the dough. Separate the dough into 4 equal parts. Cover and let stand 10 minutes. 
5. Take one ball of dough and slap it around to flatten it out. Butter the rolling pin and start rolling the dough out until it is as thin as thick cardboard, about 10 inches round. Trim all around with the pastry wheel and cut into pieces approximately 5 x 3 inches. Make 5 parallel incisions to form 6 strips within each piece. Loop every other strip in your fingers and then bring the lower opposite points together so that a pretzel shape is formed. Place them on a buttered baking sheet covered while preparing the others. (The shape is really unimportant as long as they look more or less like pretzels.) 
6. Heat the honey in a large, deep saucepan. (Honey tends to boil up rather high.) Heat the oil in the skillet to a depth of at least 1 ~ inches. Fry 6 or 7 cakes on both sides until brown (not light but not too dark). Immediately drop the cakes into the hot honey. As soon as the honey boils up, remove the cakes to the colander to drain. Sprinkle at once with sesame seeds. Serve cool. 
Note: Another type, also called shebbakia, is made by pressing leavened batter through a pastry tube (or flower pot), in the shape of rosettes, into boiling oil. 
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