Without a doubt, Baklava, is one of my favorite desserts (if not my most favorite dessert) but it is something that I have only made once or twice in my life. I have always thought it to be too time consuming and fiddly to bother with … but not this one, this one was pretty quick to make as I cheated by buying ready made Filo (phyllo dough). Before National Baklava day, which is in November, I am determined that I will attempt a non cheat version of this sweet sticky dessert by making my own Filo pastry. I will keep you posted how I get on.
I only tend to buy or eat baklava when I visit Turkey or Greece, because those that I have eaten elsewhere have always seemed to fall short in either taste or texture – in my opinion anyway. A massive 950 tons of baklava is made every day in Turkey and the average person living there eats 4.4 kilos of the stuff every year. I think that I may move to Turkey!
This Baklava is as good as many of those that I have eaten abroad. It has a good ratio of pastry to filling and the syrup that it is seeped in is not overly sweet. It still had crunch but was soft and very, very sticky inside. I made this batch with pistachios and walnuts as those are what I had to hand at the time and I used a mixture of sugar syrup, honey and lemon juice to drizzle over the pastry, so as not to end up with a syrup that was too sickly sweet! I think it turned out well – I hope, if you try it, you will agree with me.
Lastly, before I go, whilst doing a little research into Baklava I discovered that it is said to be Hitlers favorite dessert. I hope that you will not hold this against this rich, sweet pastry!
Baklava
- Prep Time: 40m
- Cook Time: 50m
- Total Time: 1h 30m
- Yield: 20 pieces
- Category: Bars & Traybakes, Biscuits & Cookies, Cakes, Desserts
Ingredients
- 1 package filo pastry (260g)
- 1 stick unsalted melted butter (115g)
- 1 cup walnuts (115g)
- 1 cup pistachios (115g)
- 1 teaspoon ground cardamon
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
For the syrup
- 1/2 cup sugar (115g)
- 1/4 cup honey (4tbs)
- 1/2 cup water (4floz)
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
Instructions
- Place the sugar, water, honey and lemon juice into a saucepan and stir on a medium/high heat until the sugar has dissolved. Reduce the heat to medium/low and boil for 4 minutes. Remove from the heat and allow to cool whilst you prepare the rest of the dish.
- Grease a 10 x 7 inch tin with butter.
- Preheat the oven to 180°c (160°c fan) 350°f
- In a mixer pulse the walnuts and pistachios with the cinnamon and cardamon until they are coarsely ground.
- Unfold the pastry sheets and trim to fit the pan. The filo sheets that I used had 6 sheets measuring 10' by 18'. I ended cutting them into 3 so I had 12 sheets measuring 10' by 7 and 6 sheets measuring 10' by 6'. Place a damp tea towel over the pastry to ensure it doesn't dry out and become unworkable.
- Lay one sheet of filo into the bottom of the greased tin and brush with melted butter. Place the next piece of filo on top and brush with melted butter. Repeat with 4 more pieces of filo, buttering each before adding the next.
- Spread 1/4 nut mix over the top and layer with 4 sheets of filo buttering each sheet before placing the next sheet on top. Repeat this procedure until you have used all the nuts. Top with the remaining 6 sheets of filo, again buttering each sheet before adding the next. Brush the top piece of filo with butter.
- Using a sharp knife cut the baklava length-ways into 4. Then make diagonal cuts width ways to make diamond shapes.
- Bake at 350°F (180°C / 160°C fan) for 20 minutes. Reduce the heat to 300°F (150°C / 130°C fan) and cook for a further 30 minutes until the pastry has puffed up and is golden brown.
- Remove the baklava from the oven and spoon the cooled syrup over the pastry. Do this as soon as the baklava comes out of the oven so that the pastry stays crisp.
- Let the baklava sit in the tin for 4 to 6 hours before serving.