Tatar Chak-Chak

Chak-chak is made by cutting egg dough into short sticks or small balls, deep frying them until golden, and pouring hot honey syrup over the pile so it sets into a mound that can be cut - dense, sticky and very sweet. It is the ceremonial sweet of Tatar and Bashkir cooking: at a wedding the bride's family brings one, decorated and sometimes very large, and it is shared out. Festival versions are built at a size that gets weighed and recorded. Because honey and eggs keep, it travels well, which is why it is the standard thing to take home from Kazan. The Chak-Chak Museum in the Old Tatar Sloboda serves it with tea in a merchant house setting and covers Tatar tea customs. Quality comes down to the honey and whether the dough was fried fresh; supermarket versions are made with syrup rather than honey and are noticeably duller.

What you actually see

• The honey binding - fried dough sticks set into a mound with hot honey syrup.
• The wedding role - the ceremonial sweet brought by the bride's family.
• The festival scale - versions built and weighed at record size.
• The museum tea - Tatar tea customs served with it in a merchant house.

When to go

All year. An hour. Buy from a bakery or market stall rather than a supermarket.

Honest expectations

Mass-produced versions use sugar syrup instead of honey and taste flat. It is extremely sweet and sticky, and not to everyone's liking. The museum visit is a booked timed session in Russian. Fresh chak-chak hardens over a few days.

Nearby

The Old Tatar Sloboda and Bauman street are both in central Kazan.