Albanian Kifle Recipe: Soft Feta-Filled Crescent Rolls (Kifle me Djath)

This Albanian kifle recipe turns simple pantry staples into soft, golden crescent rolls filled with salty feta.

These rolls are popular in Albania and Kosovo, and you can serve them warm or cold with tea or a glass of milk.

Below, you will find the full ingredient list, 16 numbered steps, and practical tips that help your first tray turn out right.

What Are Albanian Kifle?

Kifle is the Albanian name for a crescent-shaped yeast roll. The same roll appears across central Europe and the Balkans under names such as kifli, kiflice and kipferl.

This version is kifle me djath, which translates as “kifle with cheese” (djath means cheese in Albanian).

Cooks roll a soft dough around a feta filling, brush the rolls with egg yolk and butter, and bake them in a hot oven. Kifle can also be made with sweet fillings such as jam.

Unlike the French croissant, kifle uses a plain, bread-like dough, so they behave more like a dinner roll than a pastry.

Short History of Kifle

One explanation says kifle and kiflice likely trace back to the Austrian kipferl, a roll that reached the Balkans during the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This may explain the name, although the exact history is unclear.

Ingredients

For the dough

• 250 ml lukewarm milk
• 500 g white flour
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 25 g yeast
• 100 ml oil
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, beaten

The filling

• 250 g crumbled feta
• 1 egg white

For brushing and finishing

• 1 egg yolk
• Melted unsalted butter
• Sesame seeds (optional)

Yield: About 24 rolls, based on three dough balls divided into eight triangles each.

How to Make Albanian Kifle, Step by Step

Prepare and rest the dough

1. In a large bowl, whisk the lukewarm milk with the yeast, sugar and 1½ tablespoons of the flour. Leave the mixture for a few minutes while it begins to rise.
2. In a deep bowl, stir together the remaining flour, the salt, the oil and the beaten egg.
3. Pour the yeast mixture into the flour mixture and knead until the dough no longer clings to the sides of the bowl.
4. Cover the dough with a cloth and let it rest until it doubles in size, which takes roughly 30 to 40 minutes.

Prepare the tray, filling and glaze while the dough rises

5. Grease a baking tray with butter, or line it with greaseproof paper.
6. Melt a little butter in a cup for brushing later.
7. Separate the egg white from the yolk. Beat the white until it turns foamy and pale, then crumble in the feta and stir until combined.
8. Mix the yolk with a little of the melted butter to make a glaze.

Shape, fill and bake

9. Cut the risen dough into 3 equal pieces and roll each into a ball. Let the balls rest and rise again before shaping.
10. Flatten one ball into a thin round, like a pancake, about 30 cm across.
11. Slice the round in half, then into quarters, then into eighths to make 8 triangles.
12. Put a teaspoon of the feta filling on each triangle and roll it up.
13. Pinch the ends of each roll so the filling cannot escape, then set the roll on the tray. Repeat with the other two balls.
14. Brush each roll with the glaze, then top it with a little melted butter. Add sesame seeds if you like.
15. Bake the rolls for about 20 minutes in a preheated oven at 200 °C.
16. Serve the kifle warm or cold with tea or a glass of milk.

A note on oven temperature: some versions list “200 °C / 350 F”, but those temperatures are not equivalent. 200 °C is about 392 °F. Bake at 200 °C and start checking the rolls early, as ovens vary.

Tips for Better Kifle

Do not overfill

Too much filling oozes out and leaves hollow rolls. This recipe uses one teaspoon per triangle.

Roll from wide to narrow

Starting at the wider side, roll each piece toward the tip and gently shape it into a crescent.

Avoid overbaking

Overbaked kifle turn out dry, so pull them out once they are golden.

Try other fillings

Cottage cheese, ricotta, mozzarella and ham are other fillings used in Balkan crescent rolls.

FAQs

Can I measure the ingredients in cups instead of grams?

Weighing gives the most reliable result. If you only have cups, 500 g of white flour is roughly 4 US cups, 250 ml of milk is about 1 cup, and 100 ml of oil is close to 7 tablespoons. Cup measures vary with how you scoop the flour, so treat these as approximations. Weigh the yeast and the feta.

What is the difference between kifle and kiflice?

The names kifle and kiflice are used differently across the Balkans. Both can refer to crescent-shaped rolls, and the names do not always indicate whether the rolls are plain or filled. In this recipe, “kifle” refers to the Albanian name for these cheese-filled crescent rolls.

Can I serve kifle with a main course?

Yes. Kifle can be served as a snack or alongside a main meal in place of bread.