What does Easter bread mean in Eastern Europe?

DW (English)

Easter marks the end of Lent, so there's sweet Easter bread for breakfast. But the recipes vary from country to country.

Transcript

00:01Easter is one of the most widely celebrated Christian festivals in Europe.

00:06Often colored eggs are accompanied by sweet Easter bread.

00:10Once Lent is over, people can dig into the rich and tasty dishes.

00:15For the Easter, Italians bake the Colombo Pasquale, the English serve up hot cross buns

00:21and the Bulgarians bake the Kozinak.

00:24My grandmother loved kneading Kozinak by hand.

00:29We bake Kozinak every year.

00:31I buy it.

00:32I buy a delicious, wonderful Kozinak from the bakery.

00:37In this bakery near Bulgaria's capital, Sofia, they know very well how to make it.

00:42It's a very difficult ritual bread because it takes a long time to make the rich dough with

00:48many ingredients.

00:49Lots of waiting, love and effort.

00:52A good leavened dough is the basis of every Easter bread.

00:58including the Bulgarian Kozinak.

01:01But the way it's made varies in different cultures.

01:09In my family, we always made Kozinak with lard, butter and of course oil.

01:15So we have three types of fat.

01:20This makes the dough extremely rich and the Kozinak very airy.

01:31It takes several hours to make a really good yeast dough.

01:38To get a beautifully layered Kozinak, we need to give it time to rest, but also to knead it very well.

01:47A Kozinak may be braided or rolled out and folded over various fillings.

01:56In Bulgaria, Kozinak is traditionally made with raisins, but in my region we have a traditional

02:06filling it with plum jam.

02:09This makes it even better.

02:11So today we'll make some Kozinak with this jam, which I barely managed to get from my mother.

02:18After the dough has been filled and folded into shape, it goes into the oven for about 30 minutes,

02:23or until it's golden brown.

02:26After making Kozinaks all day Saturday, in the evening I have them blessed in church.

02:33We circle the church three times with a candle lit from the holy fire.

02:37I bring the flame home for good health, and the day after Easter Sunday, we enjoy the Kozinak at lunch.

02:45In Poland the Easter bread is called Hauka.

02:48In this Warsaw bakery too, the dough is kneaded and left to rise for hours.

02:54Just one ingredient is absolutely essential to the Polish version.

03:00This is the Easter bread, and we've got to celebrate this beautiful holiday properly, so

03:04we add a few handfuls of dark chocolate.

03:10We'll bake a Hauka with four strips, so we'll need four rolls of dough.

03:19A Hauka can be braided together with two, four or six strips.

03:29Some brave souls can even braid twelve strips together.

03:35Before and after baking, the Hauka is brushed with egg yolk.

03:46Then it's glazed with chocolate.

03:49The Hauka we make together is a wonderful symbol of Easter.

03:53It rises with our own yeast, just like nature comes back to life at Easter time.

03:59In Greece, the Easter holiday is inconceivable without tsureki.

04:05We start eating as soon as Lent ends.

04:09We don't wait a moment.

04:10Of course we eat tsureki.

04:12I'll go to my grandmother's to make it.

04:14On Holy Thursday we dye the eggs, and from Tuesday or Wednesday we start making the tsureki.

04:20What's special about the Easter bread that this bakery north of Athens makes is the typical

04:27Greek seasonings like the bitter, resinous gum of the mastic tree, the bitter sweet matalep,

04:33and some fresh orange zest.

04:35Tsureki is also braided.

04:37For us Christians, the braid is not only the visual part, but also symbolizes the crucifixion of Christ.

04:45That's why as we join the two wicks, the shape of the cross is formed.

04:52So let's continue with the braid.

04:56These are just a few examples of the unique Easter specialties that bring families together,

05:01create cherished memories, and make the holiday truly special.

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