Almond and Orange Blossom Water Baklava

Almond and Orange Blossom Water Bakalva

At the beginning of this month it was my husband @costopher’s birthday, and we went out with a group of friends to a Turkish Cypriot restaurant in town. We’re lucky enough to have two Turkish restaurants in town; one opened about 4 years ago to much fan fair and quickly became very popular (so much so that they had issues with their booking system), the other opened about 3 years ago and does a quiet job of very good Turkish food and won a Michelin recommendation. We went to the first restaurant when it was newly opened and had a very good meal. There weren’t many vegetarian options, but as they’d only just opened I thought that would be something that improved with time and the amount of requests they got. I’m not a vegetarian, but I do like to know where the meat I’m eating has come from, and has the animal had a good life etc. so when I eat out, I tend to go for the veggie option if I’m not familiar with the place. So, more choice would have been nice, but as I say, lovely meal. And goooooood dessert. We shared the trio of Baklava, Tel Kadeyif and Shamali. All nutty pastry/ cakey confections soaks in delicately flavoured syrup. I was a very happy customer.

After that first month the restaurant got very busy and difficult to get into, and we don’t eat out much, so we didn’t go back for a while. Then the second Turkish restaurant opened. It was also very good, and they had more veggie options, and a fish dish. The service was a little slow the first time we went, but again, every place has teething problems, so no big deal. And ohhhhh, that baklava. I’m a sucker for baklava. The second restaurant also does Sultak, which is a Turkish rice pudding, and Sniwat Fawakih, or fresh fruit platter. I must admit I’d never tried the Sultak, because if you give me options and one of them if baklava… Anyhoo, I also appreciate the fresh fruit option. It’s rare to see just fruit as a dessert in a restaurant. I know that the point of a restaurant is to have food that you wouldn’t necessarily have at home, but if you’ve had a nice meal and have just a little bit of room left for something sweet but can’t face a pastry, fruit is a welcome option.

For his birthday, my husband decided he’d like to go try the first restaurant again. We hadn’t been back since our first visit, so it would be interesting to see what had changed/ improved. The food was still very good and there were more veggie options, huzzah! Then came dessert. Again I shared the trio of desserts with my husband and two friends. Because there were 4 of us sharing a dessert for two, it was only a small mouthful each. When the desserts are this rich, I don’t see that as a problem. Lovely semolina cake, good shredded pastry, baklava… hmm. Ah well, I only got a small piece, maybe I’m just imagining it. Hmmmmmmm... One of our friends at the other end of the table ordered the baklava on its own. Her plate arrived with two HUGE rolls of bakalva. Wow. Oh dear lord, that’s a lot of deliciousness. She took one bite, and the expression on her face said it all. The baklava was dry. Dry baklava. Baklava without any syrup. Crushed nuts rolled in filo pastry.

Unlike most pastry, filo pastry contains very little fat, so you usually brush it with melted butter or oil, or construct your pastry then soak it with a butter/ milk, some sort of fatty liquid. Even when brushed with butter, the pastry can still be brittle; which is why baklava is so beautiful, because the pastry and nuts are bathed in a flavoured syrup and soak up all the flavour and moisture. Dry nuts, wrapped in brittle pastry, dusted with icing (powdered) sugar. What would posses you to do such a thing? I’m coughing at just the thought of trying to eat something so dry and scratchy.

So, in order to restore my faith in humanity, I must have some good baklava. I’ve made baklava a few times before and it’s always worked well. I don’t make it often because A. It’s expensive B. It’s very rich and you need people to share it with and C. it’s not difficult to make, but layering filo pastry and be time consuming. Baklava is definitely for special occasions.

The first time I ever made baklava was for Easter about 6 years ago. I followed Michel Roux Snr.'s recipe from his book pastry, and it was a resounding success. I’ve since made slight variations with different nuts, flavourings etc. and have always been happy with the results.

Tonight (Monday 28th) is the season finale of Game of Thrones season 7 here in the UK. No spoilers please, anyone on the other side of the pond who gets it on Sunday. It’s also a Bank Holiday and we have friends coming over to watch the show with us; so I count that as a special occasion.

This baklava is all almonds, and flavoured with orange blossom water. It’s not a combination I’ve tried before, so I’m a little nervous.

Baklava come in many shaves, sizes, flavours, nut combinations; but essentially it follows the general recipe of:

• Cut filo pastry to the size of your tray.
• Chop/ bash up/ whizz is food processor your selected nuts and ground spice combination.
• Brush sheets of pastry with butter and lay them in the tray.
• Spoon nut mixture over pastry.
• Cover nuts with more layers of pastry brushed with butter.
• Bake till light gold.
• While baking, make syrup
• Rest for a few minutes.
• Pour syrup over baklava
• Leave for 12 hours to soak up syrup

The baklava I have made here is a combination of Felicity Cloake’s recipe, and my old faithful from Michel Roux. Cloake’s recipe omits the central layers of pastry, which I personally like - almost a haiku is pastry form. She also uses all sugar and no honey, I prefer Roux’s version with honey. Roux uses cinnamon and cloves as flavourings, I’m using orange blossom water, and Cloake’s suggestion of cardamom. Cloake uses a combination of nuts, Roux uses all pistachios, I’m using all almonds.

(Makes 1 tray)

A 30x25cm tray, lined

250g butter
400g almonds
Zest of 1 lemon
1tsp ground cardamom
16 sheets of filo pastry (It won’t hart to have some extras, so I’d buy two packs and have spare sheets in case of the pastry being ripped/ damaged etc. Of course, you could make your own filo pastry, and have my unending respect )
250ml honey
80g granulated or caster sugar
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tbsp orange-blossom water (or to taste)
175ml water

• Melt the butter.
  
• Bash up the cardamom pods to release the seeds.
  
  
• Coarsely grind or chop the almonds (or whatever combination of nuts you are using) followed by the zest, cardamom and 5tbsp of melted butter. Mix well.
  
• Heat the oven to 160C/315F/gas mark 2.5.

You'll want to layout a work station with the pastry, tin, butter and nuts all in close proximity.

• Brush one sheet of pastry with butter, turn it over ad brush the other side, lay this first sheet at the bottom of the tin. The bottom layer will be a total of 6 sheets of pastry.
  
• Spoon half the nut mixture over the top evenly, but without pressing it down too firmly.
  
• Lay 4 more sheets of buttered pastry on top of this bottom layer of nuts.
  
• Spoon the remaining half of the nut mixture on top.
• Finish with the last 6 sheets of pastry, following the same process of buttering each sheet as you go.
• Use a sharp knife to cut through the layers. Once it’s baked, you will not be able to cut through the pastry neatly.
  
• Bake for an hour.
• Meanwhile, put the honey, sugar and lemon juice in a pan with 175ml of water. Bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar, then simmer for about 10 minutes, until syrupy. Take off the heat and allow to cool slightly, then stir in the orange-blossom water to taste. I used Neilsen-Massey orange blossom water and found 1 tablespoon to be enough. I would say, add a teaspoon at a time, tasting as you go. If you add too much, it will taste like soap.
• Set aside.
• When the baklava is golden, remove from the oven.
  
• Pour the syrup over the top.
• Remove and leave to cool completely, when it should have absorbed all the syrup. I make baklava the day before it’s needed, so the syrup has at least 12 hours to soak in.
• Run a knife along the lines to loosen them before attempting to lever the pieces out of the tin.

Enjoy!

p.s. I've tried one piece this morning to make sure it's not poisonous; and the lemon juice and orange blossom water has worked well together to give a lovely citrus kick to a very sweet dessert. I could maybe even have put in one more teaspoon of the orange blossom water, but I didn't want it to be over powering.