Muránske buchty

Appearance & taste

Muránske buchty are square buns 10 to 14 cm along each side, baked golden yellow and sprinkled with icing sugar. They resemble turnovers or puff pastries. Typical features are the flaky dough, the “wrapped” shape and the weight of the filling, which makes up most of the bun: 120 to 140 g of raw dough is matched by 85 to 100 g of filling.

They are filled with plums, quark, poppy seeds, nuts, strawberries, blueberries or sour cherries, apple and cinnamon, or chocolate and hazelnut. The dough is soft, compact and supple, flaky, moist and not dry. The bun smells delicately of yeast dough and filling; in the taste the ingredients, including the margarine, combine with the particular flavour of the filling.

Production

The yeast dough is prepared exclusively by hand; preparation takes three to four hours, and the dough rises twice before filling and a third time before baking. After the first rest it is divided into pieces, which are rolled out, layered with margarine and folded, which gives the flaky structure after baking. The dough is then rolled out again, divided into squares and filled.

For the “wrapping”, three corners are folded alternately over the filling to the centre; the fourth is pulled over them and almost under the bun so that the dough and filling do not dry out. The buns are brushed with egg white and not with whole egg so that they bake through well and turn a golden colour. After baking they are separated from one another on the tray and sprinkled with icing sugar once cool. The origin of the raw materials is not prescribed.

Origin & history

The area is the municipality of Muráň in the central part of the Muráň Plateau, in the Revúca district of the Banská Bystrica Region.

When the buns were first baked is not documented; according to oral tradition they go back to the 1960s. Grandmothers in Muráň passed on the recipe, and the buns were also baked and sold in the local canteen and tavern. Later they were sold in the village delicatessen, according to the specification for more than 40 years; after a break from 2014 to September 2017 they were baked again. At first the raw materials, above all for the fillings, came from private sources. The pastry has carried the village name since the second half of the 20th century, to distinguish it from similar buns.

In 2018 the buns received the quality label “GEMER-MALOHONT regional product” for products made traditionally and largely by hand. They are part of regional events such as the Easter fair in Lučenec, the Mitrovanie at the end of the herding season in Veľké Teriakovce and the Muráň rodeo.