Romanian Fluffy Mucenici - Walnut and Cinnamon Bread

Combine warm milk (not hot!) with 1 tablespoon of sugar and dry yeast.

Let sit for 10-15 minutes until it foams on top, then stir a little more.

In a bowl, combine flour with baking powder, mix.

Add the milk and yeast mixture, the oil and 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence to the bowl with flour.

Start mixing with a spatula or spoon.

Until the dough comes together and starts to get smooth.

Now sprinkle the table with a little flour, turn out the dough and knead actively for 1-2 minutes.

Return to the bowl, cover and let rise for 30-40 minutes.

After this time, turn the dough out again onto the table, cut into 12 pieces of equal size and shape into balls.

With the rolling pin, roll out each ball into a rectangle.

Brush the top with a little melted butter or oil.

Sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of sugar and a little cinnamon.

If you don't like cinnamon, you can omit or replace with coconut, cocoa, poppy seeds etc.

Roll up the rectangle.

Cut the roll into 2 parts, but don't cut in the middle.

Take the edges from one side, twist 1-2 times.

And stick the ends together. This way we shaped one half of the 8.

Do the same with the other side and we get a beautiful, simple and elegant mucenic - bun.

Shape the rest of the buns in the same way.

Along the way, arrange in an oven tray lined with baking paper. Let rise in the pan for 10-15 minutes before baking.

For beautiful shine and color, you can brush the buns with eggwash before placing in the oven. In the Lenten version, skip this step.

Bake for 20-25 minutes at 180 degrees C or until evenly browned.

While the buns are in the oven, quickly prepare the syrup. Bring 1 glass of water to the boil, add in 0.5 glass of sugar, lemon zest, vanilla and rum, to your liking.

Moist the baked, hot buns with plenty of syrup.

I had 2 trays of buns and I evenly distributed the syrup, making sure it was enough for both batches.

Sprinkle chopped walnuts on top, while the syrup hasn't dried yet, so that the walnuts can stick better.

Let the buns cool a little and the flavours infuse, but I can tell you for sure that you won't be patient ...

Mucenici are very soft, tender, fluffy and all the layers of cinnamon perfectly match the walnuts and syrup. The shape of the buns helps them stay very moist.

We liked them a lot and I think they will stay our favorites for a long time from now.

Enjoy!