Traditional Romanian Cozonac

I never understood the big deal around making cozonaci. Cozonac, or as Google is telling me, a sweet yeast dough, is a traditional Romanian treat typically made around Christmas and Easter. It's made rarely because it involves a lot of ingredients, particularly seasonal and sometimes expensive ones (traditionally, at least), like walnut. It's also famed as quite a tricky thing to bake.

Though I've been making them for over 10 years, I still get routine oohs and aahs, largely because you need to knead the dough. Now obviously, in the past, this was a laborious task that you perform by hand And spending over an hour kneading incessantly is not a fun task. However, thank goodness for technological advancement. Kneading the cozonaci with an electrical dough maker id still a bitch, since I use an ancient, handheld one. But all in all, it's supposed to be a little hard, and there's plenty of good music to listen to while kneading.

Someone gifted me this lovely new apron :D I'm a bizarre mix between a housewife and a troubadour, so got really freaking excited about this.

So, how do you make cozonaci?

I first got this recipe off of my best friend's mom when we were about 14 or 15, and I haven't felt a need to deviate in the past decade.

For the dough:

(I'm giving you the recipe for one cozonac. Traditionally, I make 2 large ones and a smaller one)

• 2 eggs
• 500 gr flour
• 2 tablespoons of full fat sour cream
• 100 g butter
• 150 g sugar
• 1 square (50g) of fresh yeast (I suppose you can also use dry, but I don't usually, so)
• 100 ml milk
• a little bit of salt
• vanilla and rum extract

You want all ingredients at room temperature. First, we melt the butter on the stove. In a big bowl, whisk together the eggs, salt, sour cream and melted butter.

Next, you'll put the milk and sugar together over low fire and stir until the sugar is fully dissolved. Now comes the tricky bit. For the yeast to activate, you want to break the block down into a little bit of this milk inside a cup. It should look something like this:

Personally, I like to set the yeast inside a bowl of warm water to encourage the yeast to grow. It should grow until it's out of the bowl, and sometimes can grow really fast, so beware.

Don't overdo it on the milk - if the mix is too watery, the yeast won't grow.

Back to the big bowl. Stir in the rest of the milk, plus the extracts, then finally incorporate gradually the flour. After a certain point, the mixture will become too thick for a spoon/whisk, which is where the kneading begins. You can either use one of these electrical thingies (which I highly recommend) or knead by hand, which is a sticky bitch. When the yeast has grown (about 10 min or so), incorporate into the big bowl, then keep kneading, occasionally adding flour as you see fit.

When it's thoroughly kneaded, the dough will form little air pustules. Kneading takes a bit, anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes. When that's done, you want to cover the bowl with a towel and keep in a warm environment (over the heater or near the oven/stove if it's turned on. The dough now needs to sit in this warmth for about 1h30 - 2hrs until it's doubled in size.

For the filling:

There's several ways to make cozonaci in Romania. There's cheese variants or ones that use Turkish delight, but personally, I'm a stickler for walnuts.

• 150 gr finely diced or ground walnut
• 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 100 gr raisins
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 3 tablespoons sugar (which I forgot for one of the cozonaci :D first time I use the directed amount of sugar in the dough, I forget the damn filling)

You just mix these into a filling-y mixture. Don't overdo it on the milk - you want it to be a thick spread.

Once the dough has risen sufficiently, lay it down and stretch with a rolling pin into a nice big ovalish shape. Cover with filling and roll tightly. It should look something like this:

(Not mandatory, but it's nice to rub some egg over the cozonac and cover in sugar and/or larger walnut bits). Set over the heating oven or near it, on a chair, for another 15 min or so, so they can begin to rise.

Keep in the preheated oven (I used something like 180C) for 30-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. The small one was done in less than 40, the bigger ones needed 45-50, so check often.

As I said, I normally use less sugar than the recipe calls for, I prefer a less sweet cozonac as it tastes nuttier and more bready. However. Since I'm not cooking just for myself and I've received more than my fair share of sugar-related complaints over the years, I decided to stick with the proper amount this year. Just saying, if you're not a big sugar fan, you can use about 1/2 of the sugar in the dough mix and it still comes out tasty. In that case, try to remember the sugar in the filling, though! :D

Enjoy!