Fliya, feliye, maznik, or palačinke, are only a few names for a type of a pancake baked in a pan placed underneath a hot earthen lid or in an oven.
There is no fixed recipe for these pancakes that are popular in Kosovo*, and there are a lot of varieties around. The essential ingredients are flour (either wheat or corn flour), water, cooking fat (butter, butterfat or cooking oil), salt, eggs, sour milk, and milk fat. The secret to a good fliya pancake is in the baking process, the batter and the pouring process.
"Fliya has two batters. The first consists of eggs, water, flour and baking powder. The second consists of yoghurt, or curdled milk, cream and butterfat. A layer of dough is applied, baked, the coals are removed and the second layer of yogurt, cream and buttermilk is poured, followed by a dough batter and so on," Sanela Idrizović, a language teacher from a village in the Prizren municipality, explains.
Fliya may be served with tea, cheese, yogurt or curdled milk or jam - whichever way you like it. Nowadays, fliya mostly features in large social gatherings, weddings, births, and other ceremonies and social events.
"I have noticed that foreigners working for different international missions relish these pancakes”, says Idrizović.
Fatima Mustafa, an 80-year-old woman from Prizren, has been using the same fliya recipe for 60 years. She always uses fresh spring water.
"I need seven eggs and half a litre of milk for one batch. I let the batter rest for two hours after stirring well, to ensure that it is even. Meanwhile, I kindle a fire and start heating up the lid. I apply a coating of butterfat on the pan and then use a slightly larger spoon than normal to pour the batter. The first layer fills the entire pan, and then strips are added, and baked," Fatima Mustafa explained.
"When you pour the batter into the pan, you cover it with one lid. Then, when this layer is done, you remove the lid and put it on the fire. Meanwhile, you pour more batter, coat it with butterfat and then cover it with a second pre-heated lid. Meanwhile, the first lid is being re-heated. Then this is repeated. You have to lift the lid 300-400 times to ensure that the fliya does not burn and is properly baked”, she added.
Fatima says that she needs around four hours for one batch, although with two sets of coals, the process is much faster. After being baked, the baked fliya sits for around 40 more minutes on a low fire to "mature." You can cut the fliya into smaller pieces and eat it with curdled milk, yogurt, cheese, jam, etc. A real energy bomb, fliya is best eaten in the morning.
Realising that there was a market for fliya, the Mustafa family solved its unemployment problem and began making fliya in the 1990s, after the mother had proposed that they start their own store. So they did, and soon they were churning out as many as 15 batches in a single day. Multiply that with €30 per batch and you get €450, a sizable sum to local standards.
Today, fliyas are the Mustafa family's sole source of income. Batches are pre-ordered and sold for €30. The family home is equipped with a basement "workshop" as they call it, with several fireplaces. The entire family works there.
The Mustafas are not the only people in the Prizren area who make fliya; there are plenty of others who are now in this business. An outing in the local mountains is almost unimaginable without these pancakes. A lot of young people, too, have been taking up the art of fliya.
The fliya pancakes are sold in supermarkets throughout Prizren and the rest of Kosovo. They are also sold alongside roads, and served in restaurants.
