Kastengel, Kaasstengels & Kaastengels

Lebaran is just around the corner. One of the most wanted cookies snack in lebaran is kastengel. A butter cheese type cookie with sand-like texture taste savoury and salty.

From its name, we can surely tell that kastengel originated from the Netherlands. Brought to Indonesia with long historical stories within these countries in the past. However, kaasstengels in the Netherlands is completely different form what Indonesian known as kastengel. Not to be mistaken, there are kaasstengels and kaastengels, this two words seem identical (but they aren’t).

Kaasstengels

Kaas-stengels means "cheese-stick", are sticks made from puff pastry and cheese on top. Usually we can found kaasstengels in bakeries, and eaten as a snack.

Kaastengels

Kaas-tengels means "cheese-fingers", are made from filo-pastry with cheese inside. They seem to be inspired by loempia or mediterranean tapas. I believe that this kaastengels is not recognize as a typically Dutch traditional but come from a modern modified formula.

Indonesia's Kastengel

I assume Indonesia's kastengel came from simplified Dutch's kaas-stengels (not kaas-tengels), with modified recipes and variations. The main differences, Indonesian version kastengel is a butter-cheese cookie while Dutch version kaasstengels is a puff pastry cheese stick (and it's also different with Indonesia's cheese stick).

So, selamat masak and... say kaas!