Thursday, March 20, 2014

Learn About Baklava And How To Make It!

By Luisa Sharpe


Baklava is a primarily Middle Eastern dessert that can also be found in Southwest and Central Asia as well as the Mediterranean. Its origins date back to the Ottoman Empire. It is a pastry like dessert that tastes very sweet and is very dense in texture. Because of its richness, it is served and eaten in very small portions.

This dessert is made using numerous layers of filo pastry that are filled with nuts that have been chopped up and topped with a syrup. It is baked in a large pan, but is sliced into smaller portions before it is baked. The smaller pieces are usually diamond, rectangular or triangular-shaped.

It is made by laying down many phyllo dough layers in a baking pan. Each layer is coated with melted butter. The chopped nut filling is placed in between the bottom set of layers and the top set of layers. The filling can be made using walnuts, pistachios or even hazelnuts and almonds. The pastry is finished with top layers of more dough.

Once the pastry has been cooked, a syrup is then poured over it. This gives it its intense, sweet flavor. The syrup can contain honey, or even rosewater. In some parts of Turkey, this dessert is topped with milk cream flavored ice cream during the summer or a specially prepared topping called 'kaymak'.

Across the region where the dessert is common, different ways of preparing it are noted, sometimes with additional or substitute ingredients. One of the reasons for varied methods of preparation is religion. An example of this is how the Greeks prepare it using the same number of layers of dough as the number of years Christ lived.

Paklava is the name given to the same dessert in Armenia. There, ingredients like cinnamon and cloves are also included. Sour cream and also vanilla are just two of the many ingredients used in Georgia. Egg yolks can be used to prepare the pastry dough in Albania. The Persian style of this dessert does not taste as rich or sweet as in the Middle East.

You can find phyllo dough at any major supermarket, in the frozen food aisle. While there are many variations on the dessert recipe, you should be able to make this dessert without any difficulty. First, butter a large pan before laying down 2 sheets of the phyllo dough. Brush melted butter onto the top sheet and repeat the previous steps with more sheet of dough until you have 8 layers. Cover the top layer with some chopped nuts mixed with cinnamon. Put 2 more dough layers over this, butter it up and add more nuts.

Place 6 to 8 further layers of phyllo dough on top to finish. Cut the pastry into squares or diamonds with a knife and put it in the oven to bake for 50 minutes in an oven preheated to three hundred and fifty degrees fahrenheit. While it is baking, make the syrup by boiling water and white sugar together, then adding some vanilla extract and half of a cup of honey. Simmer the mixture for 20 minutes and pour it over the dessert as soon as it emerges from the oven.




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