bulochka

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Russian бу́лочка (búločka) and Ukrainian бу́лочка (búločka).

Noun

bulochka (countable and uncountable, plural bulochki or bulochky)

A soft, sweet bread roll, often filled with sweet or savory ingredients, popular in Russian and Eastern European cuisine and often enjoyed as snacks or desserts.
- 1933 April 3, Cornelia Curtiss, “Entertaining by Groups and Individuals Leads Society’s Interests: Strange and Wonderful Food on Ukrainian Night Menu at the University Club”, in Cleveland Plain Dealer, 92nd year, number 93, Cleveland, Oh.: Plain Dealer Publishing Company, page 14, column 1:
  Kasha, holoubtsi, kissel, bulochki! It’s not a college yell but a part of the menu the University Club will serve Tuesday evening, April 11, when Ukrainian night is observed there.
- 1962 February 6, Harrison E[vans] Salisbury, “Shopping An Adventure For Moscow Housewife”, in Bangor Daily News, volume 73, number 200, Bangor, Me., page 20:
  There she was confronted with dozens of kinds of loaves and rolls from the soft, mealy black bread that is Russia’s traditional staff of life to beautiful bulochki or rolls made with cake flour and cinnamon and raisens^[sic] and nuts.
- 1967, Ira J. Morris, chapter III, in The Troika Belle, London: William Heinemann Ltd, page 16:
  Her ladyship was reduced to the pitiable choice of yesterday’s croissants or one of the nine different kinds of rolls, milk breads, sweet breads, scones, pancakes, vatrushki, kalachi, ponchiki, rogaliki and bulochki whose delicious, new-baked smell was wafting all over the house.
- 1971 June 7, “Meanwhile, can you survive in San Francisco?”, in Bruce B. Brugmann, editor, The San Francisco Bay Guardian, volume 5, number 3, San Francisco, Calif.: Bay Guardian Company, Inc., →ISSN, page 18:
  And we’ve got our Guardian agents at work spotting the best hamburgers and cherry sodas in town. Good homemade ice cream. The last word in piroshki and bulochka with macom.
- 1972, Sondra Gotlieb, “What to Eat and How to Cook It—a Cross-Canada Tour”, in The Gourmet’s Canada, Toronto, Ont.: New Press, →ISBN, page 109:
  Titles like “Tender Bulochky” from Wroxton, Saskatchewan, “Plain Krendli” and “Crackling Korzhiyky” — both specialties of North Battleford, Saskatchewan — reflect something of the nature and style of the Ukrainian communities that are spread across the western provinces.
- 1980 July 19, Helen Bosavage, “Bread is basic — and beautiful”, in Pottsville Republican, volume CLXLII, number 70, Pottsville, Pa., page 8, column 2:
  Other breads include bulochky, plain or rich rolls, pyrohy, yeast-raised rolls or short pastry dainties with sweet or savory filling in a standard oblong shape tapering at the ends.
- 1982, “Desserts”, in Lynn Visson, compiler, The Complete Russian Cookbook, Ann Arbor, Mich.: Ardis Publishers, →ISBN, page 286:
  CINNAMON BULOCHKI / Kaldor/Joffe / These are really sweet rolls rather than cakes
- 1991 October 19, “Write from the Heart”, in The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Oh., page 12-D, column 7:
  NATASHA, You Will Always Be My Little Bulochka V.
- 1996, Sue Lawrence, “[Scones] Rum, Raisin and Rye Scone Ring”, in On Baking, London: Kyle Cathie Limited, →ISBN, page 104:
  The idea for rye scones comes from a Russian recipe for ‘Rye Bulochki’, which are yeast-raised rolls with a texture somewhere between bread and scone.
- 1999, Natasha Templeton, “[Leningrad 1941] Everyone Has a Talent”, in Winter in the Summer Garden, Auckland: Vintage, Random House New Zealand, published 2000, →ISBN:
  Katya would go into the bread shop. […] There were different shapes and varieties. […] Every kind of bread! […] And the many kinds of bulochki. […] And she always bought Vera a sweet bulochka as well.
- 2004, Zev Katz, “Deportation: A Long Journey into Russia”, in From the Gestapo to the Gulags: One Jewish Life, London: Vallentine Mitchell, →ISBN, page 46:
  On one expedition we were very lucky with our transaction: a peasant at one of the stalls was selling bulochky (traditional Russian breadrolls) and another sold us fine apples and strawberries.
- 2005, Ulla Berkéwicz, translated by Katharina Rout, Love in a Time of Terror, Lantzville, B.C.: Oolichan Books, →ISBN, pages 29 and 111 (November 3):
  But at night when they came to see me in the Ural, when they had knocked back huge amounts of Kunzevskaya and Stolichnaya and devoured piles of piroshki, oladyi, vatrushki, and bulochki with zimmes, they spoke French, English, kissed hands and paid compliments, knew the wittiest toasts, and fiddled their Russian souls inside out in order to dance on the most crooked roofs of the most Eastern shtetl at dawn. […] Everybody has longings, I said. Shit, I said, is this guy ever going to finish with the Zionist platitudes? Stuffed my mouth with bulochki and knocked back the vodka, and didn’t challenge the Israeli when he explained that longing was a German emotion; […]
- 2005 March 17, Lisë Stern, “Obsessions”, in The Boston Globe, volume 267, number 76, Boston, Mass.: Globe Newspaper Co., Calendar, page 5, column 1:
  Breakfast pastries are a special treat — when they’re good, they’re very good. A few of my personal favorites: 1 SCONES AT CONCORD TEACAKES […] 5 BULOCHKA AT BAZAAR INTERNATIONAL This Brookline Russian gourmet market makes its own yeasted pastries, with three fillings: poppy seed, farmer’s cheese, and sour cherry.
- 2007 February 4, “School menus”, in El Paso Times, El Paso, Tex.: MediaNews Group, page 3B:
  Lunch: beefaroni or chili mac, garden salad with croutons, assorted dressing, whole-wheat bulochky, fruit cup.
- 2010, Nadejda Reilly, Ukrainian Cuisine with an American Touch and Ingredients, [Bloomington, Ind.]: Xlibris, →ISBN, pages 33 and 71:
  Plain or stuffed bulochki can be served either as snack or appetizer. […] Using the soft pastry brush, totally brush each risen bulochka (mini roll) with it.
- 2010 September 20, David Filipov, “Russia’s ‘Crazy American’: Mass. native aims to turn a provincial capital into a mecca for Internet start-ups”, in The Boston Globe, volume 278, number 82, Boston, Mass., page B5, column 1:
  He [Timothy Post] has exchanged Red Sox Nation for the Black Earth region, Newbury Street for Ulitsa Krasnaya, bagels at Baker’s Best in Newton Highlands for bulochki in this southern Russian city that bestrides the country’s breadbasket.
- 2012 October, Ksenia Rychtycka, “Homecoming: Summer 1990”, in Crossing the Border: Stories, Johnson City, Tenn.: Little Creek Books, →ISBN, page 7:
  Volodya, his government-appointed driver who usually ferries him across town without comment, has offered him coffee, poppyseed bulochky that some old babusias are selling inside the station and, in desperation to get Stefko to relax, his own pack of cigarettes.
- 2013 May 22, Sue Kidd, “Food find: Old-world bread at local European markets”, in The Olympian, Olympia, Wash., →ISSN, page C1:
  Kusher Bakery specializes in Ukrainian breads including, […] poppy seed strudel, caramel cookies (walnut-shaped), bulochka and rogalik.
- 2021 May 12, Andrew Atkins, “Restaurant news: Claudio makes gluten-free sweets”, in Naples Daily News, volume 97th, number 292, Naples, Fla., page 3D, column 2:
  Afsona, at 300 Tamiami Trail North, Naples, will be open for breakfast through May 15. From 7 a.m.-2 p.m., options include homemade beef blinis, poached eggs and bulochka.
- 2023, Victoria Belim, The Rooster House: A Ukrainian Family Memoir‎^[1], Virago, →ISBN:
  She radiated health and the kind of ripe beauty that Daria often compared to a sugar bun. ‘Pretty like a bulochka,’ she would say admiringly whenever we passed tall, plump, blonde women.

Related terms

bulka
bulkie