The last long weekend of December (6th to 9th) was celebrated the 35th Convents Sweets Exhibition in Seville’s Alcázar, and we had the pleasure to be there the day before it finished, to taste and buy some sweets. So we’re going to tell about the sweets we saw, that you can buy in the Convent's lathe during the year and once time at the year in this exhibition.

In this edition were 19 cloistered convents participating, seven from Seville (San Leandro, Santa Paula, Santa Inés, San Clemente, Madre de Dios, Santa Ana y Santa María de Jesús) and twelve of the province. In total were 290 varieties and around 6.000 kilos of sweets… Who hasn't had his mouth ever watering in front of the lathes? The smell is so sweet… So, imagine how we were with so many kilos of sweets in a room. It was very difficult to choose only one variety.

We did two walks around the Vaults Room in the Alcázar’s Gothic Palace asking about all sweets that we didn’t know yet. Finally, we were decided although wasn’t easy, all the volunteers were talking very enthusiastic about the sweets and even we could try some. We bought a variety of pastries box from the Concepcionistas Franciscanas nuns of Purísima Concepción Convent in Osuna. They assured us that their specialties are the “Bizcochos Marroquíes” or Moroccan Cakes, so we also bought a box, and we aren’t sorry about it.

The Moroccan Cakes are cake triangles very soft that have above a layer of cream made by egg yolk and sugar. The texture is very soft, creamy and sweet in the mouth and that’s the reason we are now big fans of this cake at home. Are only three ingredients in the original recipe: wheat starch, egg, and sugar. And the glaze: water, sugar, and cacao.

The variety pastries were more typical: coco, wine rings, of lemon, almond, honey, and two mantecados, made with pork fat. Among the more than two hundred varieties were the famous “Yemas de San Leandro” from the Convent with the same name, which is like a little bite of soft candy and is the most demanded and known in Seville. The ingredients are sugar, very high-quality eggs and the syrup that only some nuns are able to control. It’s a very, very special sweet.

Of course were a lot of kind of mantecados with sesame, cinnamon, ... dates filled with marzipan, pasties at the oven filled with sweet potato or citron, perrunillas (cookies), rings of anis, vanilla, wine and fried too. Almond bites, alfajores (very traditional in Christmas), and cortadillos, the most famous Christmas sweet in Seville. Also, we saw some other products made by the San Clemente Convent nuns as biologic jams and natural honey from the Seville mountain range. Of the Santa Paula Convent, we saw natural jelly, the authentic quince sweet and Sweets Red Peppers. As you can see the real difficult thing is to go out without buying something!

If you liked these exquisites bites, visit their lathes that is a very unique experience in Seville, and don’t miss this exhibition the next year! 

You can also book our tour "Christmas is Seville" and get a tasting of convent sweets.