Banitsa — Bulgarian Cheese and Yogurt Pastry

Preheat the oven to 180°C / 355°F in conventional bake mode. Beat the eggs in a large bowl. Add the yogurt and baking powder and mix until smooth; the mixture will foam and rise slightly. Mash the white cheese with a fork, leaving some coarse crumbles—grated cheese disperses like flour and will not be noticeable in the filling—and fold it in. The cheese provides enough salt, so do not add more. If the cheese is very salty, soak it in water for 10 minutes, then drain. Melt the butter and let it cool slightly.

Lay out the yufka sheets one at a time. Use half of the melted butter in total to brush a thin, even layer over each sheet; do not let it pool, because spots with excess butter will not open up as they bake. Divide the filling evenly among the six sheets (about 150 g per sheet). Spread it with the back of a spoon, leaving a 2 cm border. The filling is wet and can soften the pastry if it sits on top too long, so roll each sheet as soon as you have spread the filling, then move on to the next.

Starting at a long edge, loosely roll each yufka sheet; a tightly rolled pastry cannot hold steam and may stay doughy in the middle. Coil the first roll like a snail in the center of a greased 28 cm round pan. Add each following roll to the end of the previous one and continue coiling outward. Leave about 1 cm between the rolls. This is the traditional shape of banitsa; scrunching the pastry and placing it loose in a pan makes a different pastry, while this recipe uses rolls.

Brush the remaining melted butter over the top, then drizzle with 100 ml of milk. Bake on the middle rack of an oven preheated to 180°C / 355°F for 40–45 minutes; do not open the oven door during the first 25 minutes. Check for three signs of doneness: the entire top is deep golden, the bends of the rolls are browned, and the center does not wobble when you gently shake the pan. If the center still jiggles, the filling is not cooked; bake for 5 more minutes.

Remove the pan from the oven, sprinkle 2–3 tablespoons of water over the top, and immediately cover the pan with a clean kitchen towel. Let it rest this way for 15 minutes. The yufka top is very crisp straight from the oven; steam trapped under the towel softens it. Banitsa left uncovered can crack and crumble on top when sliced. This resting time is not included in the baking time; the pastry cools as it rests.

Remove the towel and use a sharp knife to cut the banitsa in half, then into slices; the spiral shape makes the slices look like pieces of cake. Serve warm or hot, with ayran or plain yogurt on the side. To reheat it the next day, bake at 160°C / 320°F for 8 minutes to crisp the top again. A microwave will soften it, and the crisp texture will not return.