Pardubice Gingerbread

Pernik is honey cake: rye or wheat flour, honey, spices and no fat or eggs in the oldest recipes, with the dough traditionally left to mature for weeks or months before baking, which is what gives it the texture. Pardubice has made it since at least the sixteenth century, when the town's gingerbread guild was regulated, and Pardubicky pernik holds EU protected geographical indication. Two forms are made: hard pressed gingerbread, shaped in carved wooden moulds - hearts, riders, saints, scenes - which was given as a token and hung rather than eaten, and soft iced gingerbread, cut and decorated with white piping, which is what is sold to eat today. The moulds themselves are an object of collection and there is a gingerbread museum at Rabstejnek chateau near the town covering the craft, the moulds and the guild history.

The main sights

• Dough matured for weeks - the traditional practice behind the texture.
• Carved wooden moulds - hearts, riders and scenes pressed into hard gingerbread.
• Soft iced gingerbread - the piped and decorated version sold to eat.
• A protected name - EU geographical indication for Pardubicky pernik.

When to go

All year; strongest at Christmas. An hour.

Good to know

Much gingerbread sold at Czech markets is industrial and not the protected product. Hard pressed gingerbread is a keepsake, not really food - it is very hard. The museum keeps limited hours.

Nearby

Pardubice old town and Kuneticka hora are close.