Cozonac cu Maia. Sourdough ROMANIAN COZONAC. | by JoyRideCoffee

Cozonac cu maia. Sourdough Romanian Cozonac. I am pleased to present you one of the most popular product taken from romanian ovens. Even if I'm not an expert, I try and practice to make the tastiest one. My favorite recipe is from Silviu (Iasi - Moldova region) who was kind enough to give me a cozonac (as gift) that completely changed my perception about them.

About Cozonac:
Every nation has an "oven queen." In Romania, the "queen" that comes out of the oven, especially at family meals during the Christmas and Easter holidays is called "Cozonac". It is a traditional Romanian product that is inspired by French sweet bread and Russian enriched dough with butter, eggs, oils. We can find it in different variants in the Balkans. The Bulgarian neighbors also have something similar called "kozunak" and the ancient Greeks made a type of cake sweetened with honey and sprinkled with nuts, which was called "plakous". Hungarian friends use a similar dough to their delicious "kurtos kalacs". The romanian "Cozonac" is a kind of poorer relative of the fragrant king - "panettone", the Italian one.

It has a perfectly balanced taste between sweet and fatty components complemented by flavors from the filling as you can rarely find in a food. Your nostrils will remain swollen with aromas and so will your house. An art. And what art can be more perfect than the one that works with so many senses? Appearance, texture, aromas, scents ...

But to bake an amazing & authentic "cozonac" you need a lot of respect for what it represents for the whole nation. And to look through the authentic, unaltered recipes beyond chemicalized and industrialized production.

If you are a beginner, like me, and you will try to do it at home with "sourdough starter", as I want to do it, you will have a huge challenge. Natural ferments do not feel very good in a sweet and high-fat environment. I'm still in tests but I think this video is a good start.

Recipe & Method

Stiff Sourdough Starter (prefermet)
- 200g flour
- 90g water
- 40g sourdough (mine was at 85% hydration)
Let it rise for 10 hours at 22-23 deg C

Dough
- 670g strong flour
- 260g milk
- 330g stiff startet (from above)
- 102g butter
- 46g oil
- 220g sugar
- 166g egg yolks (~11 egg yolks)
- 9.2g salt

Mix well 20-30mins, step by step, until gluten is medium/well developed. Then let it rest on room temperature (22-23deg C.) for 5 hours. Make coil folds at each 45mins. After 5 hours, divide it in two equal pieces and put them into the fridge for 8hours.

Remove from the fridge an let it warm for 30-45 mins. Spread well and evenly on the table (about 1 cm thick) and add the filling (4 egg white ~ 120g, sugar 80g, nuts 200g, cocoa 10g), roll them and add it into trays. Let them at 22-23deg C for 10-13 hours.

Paint them with egg yolk & milk, then bake them at 180-190deg C (some steam will help) for ~ 40mins.

Will fit into your program if early in the morning you will mix everything then make folds until 13:00-14:00 then divide and move into the fridge. In the evening at 22:00-23:00 put them in trays and let them to proof overnight.

Next morning bake them for 35-40mins. at 180deg. C.

If you're like me animated by the same passion, subscribe & comments are most welcome.

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Видео Cozonac cu Maia. Sourdough ROMANIAN COZONAC. | by JoyRideCoffee канала Bread by Joy Ride Coffee