Cheese burek is a flaky pastry that is created by skillfully layering thin sheets of phyllo dough or Turkish pastry sheets (yufka) with a savory cheese mix of crumbled feta, curd, cottage cheese, or cream cheese. The pastry is bound together with eggs, yogurt, milk, sour cream, sparkling water, or a mix of oil and butter. It is then panfried until it becomes golden and crispy. Burek is often baked in a cake-like shape and then cut into generously-sized slices!
Cheese burek is often eaten in Serbia in the mornings or, as I chose to eat it, in the early afternoons. It is a part of everyday life that every Serb has partaken in at some point.
Although it may seem like a simple pastry, burek carries a history that stretches back centuries. Prior to the 7th century, Central Asian Turkic nomads layered thin sheets of dough over open fires and filled them with readily available ingredients such as milky cheeses and wild herbs. Even the word burek carries clear traces of this history, stemming from the Turkish word bürmek, meaning “to roll” or “to twist” something.
As the Ottoman Empire expanded its influence, burek became part of the culinary traditions of many countries in the region, making its way to the Balkans during the late 14th and 15th centuries, where it developed into the beloved Serbian classic cuisine I encountered today.
