2023 Christmas Treats – Bebinca, Traditional Goan Christmas Sweet

Well, I can finally say I did it! Is it perfect? Well of course not, but I’m pleased with it!  It is referred to as the Queen of Goan sweets.  I’m speaking of course, of Bebinca (also called bibik). A long story follows, it tells of my first encounter learning to make bibik with a true purist and top notch bibik maker.  You can skip to the recipe if you wish to avoid reading about it, but it will explain why it has earned a place on every Goan table where special occasions are celebrated – weddings, christenings, Easter and Christmas.  Here is my adapted recipe for a true Goan Christmas Treat – Bebinca.  

Bibik is made from coconut milk, sugar, eggs, flour and some ghee with a dash of nutmeg. I had the pleasure of making this with a true expert long (maybe 30 or so years ago) ago, much before I became a Chef. I say it was a pleasure because my friend learned how to make this from her grandmother. And whenever a recipe is being passed down by a creator, you get more than a recipe, you get technique as well.  I learned just how much technique it took when the full day went into making this royal Goan sweet.  It started with scraping coconuts into a bowl using a tooth-edged piece of metal, usually attached to something – a small bench or seat. The seat gave you leverage for scraping the white coconut flesh against the toothed blade yielding shredded coconut.   This shredded coconut, was placed in a cloth and squeezed to wring out all the milk – this was the “first pressing” of coconut milk and what was required for bibik (think of olive oil where the first pressing yields extra virgin olive oil).  Sounds simple right? Well, yes if you have scraped a few hundred coconuts! Back home in Goa (I’ve never been by the way), I’m told, this is a fairly common task as fresh coconut is used in most sweet and savory dishes – curries, sweets etc. and almost every home has coconut trees in their yard, so really it is not unusual to have grown up in Goa, scraping coconuts as a matter of routine! Lucky people!

Once we had the coconut milk, we then cracked the eggs and separated them. I think we used 24 eggs. It was a big batch of bibik we were making. Then sugar and flour were mixed with the coconut milk, and the eggs – and of course, it was mixed by hand into a smooth batter – you tired yet? I’m exhausted!  Now came the baking of the dish. Depending on the size of the container being used – my friend had special tins just for this purpose.  She started the process of pouring about a cup of batter into one of the containers and placed it in a hot oven for the first bake – about 8-10 minutes. It came out beautifully brown on top – burned I thought, but absolutely not so. A bit of ghee was poured on top of this layer and swirled to cover it, then another lesser quantity of batter was poured on top and baked, this time at a lower temperature and for longer.  This longer baking ensured the layer would be cooked through but also give the top a darker hue. But this is where the skill comes in. Even with the lower temperature, you had to watch it closely.  It would go from perfect to burned in seconds.  Clearly something you cannot walk away from.  Cooking time in this and subsequent layers, between 20 and 25 minutes!  So, it is easy to see how the whole day passed.  Imagine doing this for 4 bibik with 7 layers each. Traditionally, I’ve been told, bibik has 7 layers but can go up to about 16.   This darkening of the top is what distinguishes the layers.  What I’ve done is used caramel (browning) to color the entire layer helping this process.  Is it cheating?  Absolutely not,  just helping the process along while maintaining some level of acceptable integrity.  

The process stayed with me long after the pain of the day wore off. I never wanted to go through that, and was resigned to only eating bibik if someone visiting from Goa brought it for us or if my friend or my sister-in-law made it. Again, knowing how it was done back home, you knew why it was reserved for and only served on special occasions. Fast forward to a few years ago, another friend of mine gave me a piece of his bibik to try.  I was blown away when I tried it and even more so when he said he used canned coconut milk.   I’ve used this in many cooking classes when making curries over the last 12 years.   My favorite is Aroy-D, the only ingredient is coconut!  I’d been under the wrong assumption about the coconut milk.  All of a sudden, this was a doable item for me.  Naturally I tried it last year for the first time and failed miserably.  A delicious fail though.  I had sporadically tried it since that first time, each time a different kind of fail.  I’ve actually made it twice in the last two weeks as I really wanted to get one that I could show you.  

Finally, after reading through several Goan recipes and several Youtube videos, I adapted my friend’s recipe with about two other recipes I’d tried, and came up with this version. It uses canned coconut milk and browning caramel, just like he did in his version.  I think this adapted recipe really opens up the possibility to a whole generation of cooks who always wanted to make bibik  but were too afraid, to finally give it a try.   So I say to all of you, let the purists scrape and toil, but you can make bibik almost effortlessly in less than 2 hours, and it is a pretty good version of the original recipe!  Of course there is room for improvement, but then isn’t there always in cooking?  One last thing, bibik is typically served in small slices – think of how you typically serve fudge.  This is a rich dessert – a little goes a long way!  Check out the “Tips” section for some additional learnings and, watch for the next blog on what to do with all those egg whites.  As always – enjoy!