I know Easter is over and you are probably sick of Easter recipes. But in the religion of most of the Bulgarians, the Greek Orthodox, another calendar is used. Therefore the traditional Easter will be celebrated on May 5th, which is a coule of weeks ahead.
However, for last Sunday I made traditional Bulgarian Easter bread using a recipe from my aunt. It is an yeast dough, originally with butter inside. But after discussing it with my grandma on the phone, I decided to use oil instead of butter, so the baked cakes do not dry out very fast. This was a very important thing to me, because the amount of dough you get as a result is quite big and can usually be eaten for days.
In this post, I am publishing this traditional recipe the way I used it. I think it turned out quite delicious, just like I remember it from Bulgarian bakeries. Some of the instructions are not exact, like baking time or the amount of flour. But I am sure that if you have a little practice with yeast dough and a feeling for baked goods, you will succeed.
Traditional Bulgarian Easter Bread
9 eggs
350 g (12 oz) sugar
250 ml (1 cup + 1 tbsp) sunflower oil
350 ml (1 1/2 cup) milk
30 g (1 oz) yeast (or 2 pckt. active dry yeast)
all purpose flour, about 1,5 kg (12 cups)
1 pinch salt
1. Put 2 tbsp sugar, the milk, 1 pinch of salt and yeast into a bowl. Stir in about 90 g (3/4 cup) of flour, until you get a kind of thin mash. Let that sit at a warm place (e.g. over the heater) for about 100 minutes.
2. Add all the other ingredients and stir with hooks until everything is incorporated. Add flour until you can knead it. Add flour until the dough stops being sticky, add some tablespoons of oil from time to time, this will speed up the effect a little. The dough should look like a lot of parallel threads when you pull it apart. Let sit at a warm place until the dough has doubled its size, for abour 90 minutes.
3. Form the dough and place it into oiled pans. You can form braids, rolls, etc. Let sit at a warm place for about 60 up to 90 minutes, until the dough has doubled its size again. Preheat oven to 160°C (325°F).
Bake the breads until a toothpicker comes out clean. Put a baking sheet on top of them after 5 minutes of baking, this way they will not burn on top.
I’m sitting right here with a warm tea by my side. I’m freezing. It is so freaking cold here in Europe. My brother and I have a cold and in the middle of our sneezing session, we decided we needed a shortbread cake.
I have already showed you the family recipe à la Mama . THis one here is the Easter version of it. Prepared in a round pan and without Nutelly in the whipping cream. Tasted just as good.
I am very proud of this nest which is made of edible Easter grass and marzipan eggs breeded by a chocolate hen. I bet her chicken will be chocolate covered marzipan! :D Hope you have nice holidays, despite the temperatures. xoxo
Bulgarian Shortbread Cake
(makes about 10 pieces)
400 g (14 oz) shortbread
1 l (4 cups + 4 tbsp) milk
2 pck. Chocolate pudding powder
6 tbsp. sugar
500 ml (2 cups) heavy cream
sprinkles, decoration (optional)
Place one layer of cookies in a round cake pan. (Everything about 10“ is okay.)
Prepare the pudding as written on the package with the milk and sugar. Pour a part of the hot pudding on the cookies, which is enough to cover them and smooth it down. Place another layer of cookies on top of the pudding. Put one more layer of pudding on top. Continue like this, until you have no more pudding, the last layer must not be cookies.
Let the cake cool completely. Prepare the topping in the meanwhile.
Beat the heavy cream with a mixer until it is stiff. When the cake is cooled, place the cream on top and smooth down. Decorate as you like. Let the cake chill for at least one hour in the fridge.
Serve and enjoy :)
This week, a packet of almond flour found its way to my home. Muhahahahahahah. Finally. I had a so-so first try on macarons, which tastet great, I think, but did not develop feet and did not look very photogenic, either. So you are not getting a picture of this now. Maybe someday, when I succeed. But almond flour is a multitalent and can be used in many recipes.
I came across a blueberry muffin recipe this week in a Dr. Oetker book called simply “Muffins”, which was way too simple for me to try it. But as I have experienced that Dr. Oetker’s doughs mostly turn out very soft and airy, I changed the whole thing a little and made fresh, modern cherry muffins.
I did not use chopped hazelnuts, but almond flour. I’m sure it works just as well with the same amount of less fine ground almonds. With the right cupcake wrappers they become a nice Easter treat :) As a decoration, I piped chocolate frosting on Top and placed mini chocolate eggs inside the nest. I won’t give the frosting recipe to you, because it is not developed enough… But the cupcake recipe is.
Easter Nest Cherry Cupcakes
130 g (1 cup + 1 tbsp) flour
130 g (1 cup + 1 tbsp) almond flour or ground almonds
2 tsp baking powder
4 eggs
130 g (1/2 cup + 1 tbsp) sugar
200 g (1 cup – 2 tbsp) butter, softened
100 ml (1/2 cup – 2 tbsp) milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
150 g (5 oz.) cherries, fresh oz frozen
Line a muffin pan with paper molds. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).
Put all ingredients except cherries in a mixing bowl. Beat until the batter is smooth. Add the cherries and mix just a little until they are spread evenly in the dough.
Fill the muffin molds up to 2/3 and bake for about 25 minutes. After taking them out of the oven, the cakes will flatten a bit. But in return, you get moist, soft and fruity dough. Mhhhh.