Easter loaves of bread

If Germany can boast with its loaves of bread which are more than 300 types, you can taste the famous Easter loaves of bread – Easter cakes /Kozunatsi/ only in Bulgaria. The Bulgarian woman prepared ritual loaves of bred for centuries especially for Easter – the most popular Christian holiday. The dough for them was made of flour and leaven, it was kneaded several times as it was left to risen. Round loaves of bread were made of it – big ones, small ones which were decorated with red eggs, people moulded an open gate around them so that there would be rich harvest in the house or they made small holes in which they stick a blade of geranium. The day that was the holiday people gave the ritual loaves of bread to old and young, relatives and neighbors in order to be healthy and happy all the year round.
Today the Easter round loaves are part of the everyday life of Bulgarian people. They can be prepared all the year round from the recipe of our grandmothers. In the form of fur caps, rolled up or braided like the number of eight, the Bulgarian Easter cakes are a real work of art. Fresh, with toasted golden brown sheet dusted with crystal sugar and decorated with walnuts, raisins and lemon peels, they are a pleasure even for the most excellent taste. They are a small culinary temptation when they are served with a pat of butter, a slice of white brined cheese or a glass of Bulgarian yoghurt.
However, you can feel the magic of the Bulgarian Easter cakes on Easter. It is enough only to see them, to smell their nice fragrance to be really seduced.