Happy Friday everyone! We are back on track with our recipes over here at ballerina baker, and you can expect a steady stream of new content headed your way! I have officially started testing for the fall season, which is my favorite. I’ve got some fun, cozy recipes headed your way so get excited!
I’m back in school now and I’m in this weird kind of limbo where its back to school time, but it still feels like summer outside. Now that I’m back I feel like it needs to be fall right away. Stepping out of school into 100 degree weather is just not ideal. But I suppose patience is key, because fall will come.
In the mean time, we’re keeping the warm weather recipes coming for the rest of the month. Like this one, which uses that sweet and delicate rose flavor I love to play around with so much. Plus I feel like the syrupy, flakey texture of baklava is just perfect for end of summer.
What is Baklava
A wonderful question! Baklava is a layered flakey pastry. It uses stacked layers of phyllo pastry, layered with a sweet (in this case, with chocolate) nut mixture, and its soaked in a honey syrup. It’s actually a lot easier than it may seem, but I assure you it’s 100% as tasty as it sounds.
Describe this Recipe to Me
Taste: There are a lot of flavors in this dessert, but they all blend beautifully well together. The phyllo has this delicate, buttery flavor, while the filling has puddles of bittersweet chocolate and toasty hazelnuts. The honey soak on top is infused with rose water to give it that perfect finishing touch.
Texture: Baklava is sort of known for it’s unique texture, with beautiful flakey phyllo pastry, a bit of a crunch from the hazelnuts, gooey chocolate chunks, and a syrupy honey soak. The combination of the flakey pastry and the syrupy honey go hand in hand together to create a unique and delicious treat.
Ease: Because we aren’t making our own phyllo pastry for this recipe, it’s actually quite simple to throw together. The nut filling comes together quickly in a food processor, and the butter we use for layering is quickly browned on the stove. We layer those things with the pastry, which is already rolled out and shaped. For the honey soak, it comes together very easily and quickly on the stove, and is then poured over the finished baklava. So all in all, it really isn’t too difficult.
The Hazelnut Chocolate Filling
Traditionally, the filling of a baklava is made from a mixture of different nuts, usually walnuts, pistachios, and hazelnuts. Because hazelnut is a prominent flavor here we are only using hazelnuts. As for the chocolate, we just chop it up with the nuts in a food processor so the baklava is speckled with puddles of melted chocolate. Aside from that there really isn’t much else to the filling other than some spices.
The Soak
The honey soak is where most of the rose flavor comes from. It’s just a mixture of honey, rosewater, water, and vanilla that we bring to a boil on the stove. We pour this over the baked baklava and it soaks into all the layers, filling the baklava with sweet syrup and a delicate rose flavor.
Chocolate Hazelnut Rose Baklava
Ingredients
Method
- Preheat the oven to 350℉.
- Add the hazelnuts, chocolate, cinnamon, and cardamom to a large food processor, and pulse until broken down and chopped up, but not a fine crumb. Set aside.
- Heat the butter in a medium sized saucepan over medium heat. Once melted, keep cooking, stirring frequently, until very lightly browned. Remove from the heat and let cool for 10 minutes in the pan.
- Divide your phyllo dough into three equal chunks. The number of layers in each doesn't have to be exact, you can eyeball it. Place one of the chunks in an even layer in a 9×13 inch rectangular baking pan. Pour/spread a third of the brown butter on top, and sprinkle half of the nut filling on top of that. Add the second chunk of phyllo dough on top, and repeat this process using another third of the butter, and the rest of the nut filling. Finally, place the remaining chunk of phyllo pastry on top and pour/spread the remaining butter on top.
- Using a serrated knife, cut the uncooked baklava into squares in the pan. Bake for 40-45 minutes or until browned on the top. Let the baklava cool in the tray for 40 minutes before adding the honey topping.
- In a medium sized saucepan, whisk together the honey, water, rosewater, and vanilla. Bring the mixture to a boil over medium high heat. Once boiling, turn the temperature down to low to simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat, and let cool for 5 minutes.
- Pour the warm honey mixture evenly on top of the still warm baklava. Enjoy warm, or leftovers last up to 4 days sealed in an airtight container at room temperature.