Recipe of the week

“Not all cakes have to involve three layers, chocolate frosting, and birthday candles,” say the editors at TastingTable.com. At Comal, a restaurant in Denver that’s an incubator for women building businesses around heritage cooking, Syrian refugees Vian Alnidawi and Sara Nassr have become known for their basbousa, a semolina cake bathed in sweet syrup and dusted with coconut. They flavor the cake with lemon, but you can also substitute a few splashes of rose or orange-blossom water.

2 cups fine semolina • 2 cups dried, unsweetened coconut • 2 cups granulated sugar • 2 cups all-purpose flour • 1 tsp kosher salt • 1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt • 3 eggs • 2 tsp baking powder • 2 tsp vanilla extract • 1¼ cups granulated sugar • 1¼ cups water • 1 tsp lemon juice • finely chopped pistachios • unsweetened coconut

• Preheat oven to 350. In a bowl, combine first nine ingredients into a thick batter and press into either a 9-by-13-inch baking dish or a 10-inch springform pan that’s been greased and lined with parchment. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until center is set. Turn oven to broil for 3 to 4 minutes to brown the top of the cake. Let cool.

• Meanwhile, make the sugar syrup. In a saucepan, combine the sugar and water over high heat; boil until sugar is dissolved. Add lemon juice and allow syrup to cool slightly before slowly pouring it over the cake until it’s completely absorbed. To serve, cut into pieces and garnish each with the chopped pistachios and additional coconut.