I use a round, deep, 30 cm/diam baking tray

This tutmanik is absolutely divine – soft, fluffy … and fills the house with an authentic scent of freshly baked bread. The recipe I learned from my mother-in-law who often prepares it for family gatherings and it always tastes great! In this case, my husband kneaded the tutmanik (which you see in the photo). As always, his baking is simply flawless!

Products

for the dough:

4 cups flour

3 eggs

1 cup fresh milk

1 tsp sugar

50 g fresh yeast

1 tbsp salt

1 tbsp oil

1 tbsp vinegar

¼ cup water

for the filling:

2 eggs + 1 egg white (beaten)

400 g white Feta cheese (dry, hard and mashed)

I will also need:

1 egg yolk to spread the tutmanik

Preparation:

Dissolve the yeast in the fresh milk (which should be lukewarm), sprinkle with a pinch of sugar and wait for it to activate.

Put the flour in a large bowl; make a well in the middle where I pour the ready yeast mixture. I add the other products for the dough, incl. salt (on the periphery) and knead. I knead until bubbles appear on the surface.

Cut the dough into 6 pieces, from which I make pita**. On a floured surface, I roll out the first pita to get a phyllo sheet with a size equal to the diameter of the tray (30 cm in my case). Put it in a previously greased baking tray. Spread it with sunflower oil, sprinkle some of the beaten eggs and mashed white cheese.

I roll out the second pita and again repeat every step – put it in the baking tray on the top of the filling of the first phyllo, spread with sunflower oil, sprinkle with eggs and white cheese, and so on and so on … until the phyllo (pita) runs out. The last one I spread with sunflower oil and, on the top, with yolk.

I cut the tutmanik into squares and let it rise. It almost doubles its volume.

Bake at 200ᴼC in a preheated oven. 10 minutes after baking, I reduce the heat to 180ᴼC. If the upper crust becomes brown too soon (which sometimes happen), then cover it with wet baking paper. I check to see if the tutmanik is ready with a wooden skewer. Bake for about 40 minutes (it is quite indicative, you have to check).

Just an idea:

You can skip the eggs in the stuffing, and just spread the crusts with sunflower oil and sprinkle with cheese. Then you will get the likeness of the puff pastry dough.

* Tutmanik is traditional Bulgarian bread with cheese.

** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pita