Syrok -- Russian "Mini-Cheesecake"

For weeks, I stared in fascination and fear at the small packages labeled "syrok" at the local grocery store. They were in the section with yogurt and appeared to be targeted at children and women. "Syr" means cheese, and so I knew they were little cheese snacks, but I could not figure out why the packages advertised flavors like cherry, caramel, vanilla, apricot, and even chocolate. I imagined these syrok to be like string cheese, and I could not imagine how string cheese would taste with such sweet flavors.

On my first business trip, I found myself standing in a grocery store in Tatarstan with my Russian partner, trying to figure out what to eat for a fast lunch. Suddenly, I noticed the syrok packages. "What ARE these?" I asked her in horror. She laughed and told me to try one, assuring me that I would like it. I picked out one with apricot and bought it.

Outside the store, I opened the package and instead of the string cheese I had imagined, I found a chocolate-covered nugget of tvorog! Tvorog is often translated into English as "cottage cheese," but I think this gives an entirely incorrect impression of tvorog. In fact, it's more like a cross between American-style cottage cheese and cream cheese. It's a slightly sweet curd cheese that reminds me vaguely of the cheese in American cheesecake -- sweet, rich, and smooth. Russians eat it with sugar and cream for breakfast, baked into squares for breakfast or a dessert, or inside bliny (crepe-like pancakes) and pirozhki (pastries). I will write more about tvorog in future blog entries because it's a fascinating dairy product and one of my very favorites.

The syrok is a perfect use of tvorog and reminds me very much of American cheesecake. There are numerous versions of the syrok sold in grocery stores here, as you can see from the picture above. Almost all are coated with a thin layer of chocolate. Inside, some have tvorog that has been flavored with chocolate, vanilla, or some fruit, while others have unflavored tvorog with a fruit jam or chocolate filling in the center. My personal favorites are the the ones with jam inside and a graham-cracker-like cookie on the bottom of the "mini-cake." I think that caramel filling, chocolate filling, and apricot are the best I have tasted.

Below is a picture of the inside of a syrok. This one was flavored with apricot but did not have a jam filling. As far as I know, these syrok are a new, mass-marketed creation, but the idea likely goes back historically. People often make baked bars out of tvorog, and there are patties called "syrniki" that are made of fried tvorog. I will write more about these and other uses for tvorog in the future.