Baklava
A delicate and rich dessert pastry.
Servings Prep Time
40pieces 3.5hours
Cook Time
50minutes
Servings Prep Time
40pieces 3.5hours
Cook Time
50minutes
Ingredients
Dough
Filling
  • 125g walnuts1 cup equivalent; coarsely chopped
  • 75g unsalted butter1.5 sticks equivalent; melted and clarified
Syrup
Instructions
Dough
  1. Mix all the dough ingredients together in a large bowl. Start with most of the flour amount and add progressively as you kneed the dough until the targeted consistency is achieved.
  2. Kneed the dough for about 8-10 minutes to make a soft, non sticky dough. Cover and let it rest for 15 minutes.
  3. During the resting time, prepare syrup as per instructions below.
  4. Lightly dust a counter working surface with a flour. Roll the dough into an even cylindrical shape and divide into 3 even sections.
  5. Roll each of these 3 sections again into a cylindrical form and further divide into a 4 equal parts.
  6. Roll each of these sections again into the smallest cylinder up to this point, and divide again into additional 4 equal size parts. Roll each piece between your palms and form a ball. At the end you will end up with 48 soft dough balls with an approximate diameter of 3 cm (~1″). Divide the balls in 3 groups of 16, put aside and cover to prevent drying out.
  7. Add a cornstarch to a small bowl.
  8. Take the first dough ball and roll it freely in the corn starch. Squeeze the ball lightly with your fingers and flatten it with your palm against the cornstarch-dusted counter. Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough into approximately 15 cm (6″) round shape. Dust the top of the rolled dough layer with cornstarch again and put aside. This is an important step that will assure that layers don’t stick together as you stack them up.
  9. Take the second ball and repeat the whole procedure until you create a stack of 16 dough layers. Put it aside.
  10. Repeat an identical process until two more stacks of 16 dough layers are formed.
  11. Butter 30 cm (~12″) round baking pan.
  12. Using a rolling pin carefully roll out the first stack to 30 cm (~12″) round shape. Flip the stack back and forth and dust with cornstarch as needed. Don’t worry if some cracks develop around the edges or on the top layer. Place the developed stack in the baking pan.
  13. Sprinkle with half of the chopped walnuts and spread evenly.
  14. Repeat the same process with the second stack and place it on top of the walnut layer. Sprinkle and spread evenly the reminder of the chopped walnuts.
  15. Roll out the final third stack and place it on the top of the second walnut layer.
  16. Using a sharp knife, cut the baklava into approximately 3 cm (~1″) wide diamond or rhombus shapes.
  17. Preheat the oven to 175 °C (350 °F).
  18. Melt the butter over low heat to avoid burning. As the butter melts, skim the foam formed on the surface. These are milk proteins that will burn in the oven if not removed.
  19. Spoon the hot butter across the full baklava surface running along cut lines.
  20. With the rack in the middle of the oven, bake for about 50 minutes or until golden brown. After the baklava is taken out of the oven, let it cool for 10 minutes before adding the syrup. This is very important since adding syrup to hot baklava will make it soggy.
  21. Laddle the syrup by running along baklava’s cut edges. Let it fully soak in, the best if left overnight.
Syrup
  1. Add sugar and water to a medium size sauce pan. Over medium heat, stir it gently until the sugar is fully dissolved. Once the boiling point is reached, reduce the heat to low and let it simmer for 14 minutes.
  2. Add lemon juice and let it simmer for another minute. Take it of the heat and let it cool to room temperature before ladling the baklava.