**The Art of Making Baklava: A Step-by-Step Guide**

As I began making my version of baklava, I couldn't help but feel a sense of excitement and anticipation. The process involves layers of phyllo dough, nuts, and sweet syrup, which is both a delight to make and a pleasure to eat. My friend and I started by preparing the pistachios, grinding them on up to create a smooth texture that would add a nice crunch to our baklava. We carefully observed how the pistachios looked, taking note of their color, shape, and size.

Next, we prepared the simple syrup, which is infused with saffron threads for its distinctive golden hue and subtle flavor. The aroma wafting from the pot was enticing, and I couldn't wait to taste it in our finished baklava. We began assembling the layers of phyllo dough, carefully brushing each layer with butter to act as the glue that binds everything together. We used a store-bought phyllo dough for convenience, but feel free to make your own if you're feeling adventurous.

The phyllo dough is truly unique in its properties – it's precisely 13 inches by 18 inches, making it easy to cut into a standard 9x13 inch size that fits perfectly in our pan. We carefully placed the first layer of phyllo at the bottom of our pan, followed by layers of nuts and sweet syrup, repeating this process until we reached the desired consistency. The layers of phyllo added an extra layer of crunch to our baklava, while the nuts provided a delightful texture contrast.

As we assembled our baklava, I couldn't help but think about the cultural significance of this traditional Middle Eastern dessert. Baklava is often served at special occasions and celebrations, such as weddings and holidays, and its intricate layers are said to represent the complexities of life itself. In many parts of the world, including Turkey and Greece, baklava is a staple dessert that's often enjoyed during social gatherings.

When it came time to cut our baklava, we opted for a diamond pattern, which added an extra layer of visual appeal to our creation. Cutting diagonally across the baklava created a beautiful, symmetrical design that was both aesthetically pleasing and Instagram-worthy. We carefully placed our finished baklava in the oven, where it would undergo a magical transformation from raw dough to golden-brown perfection.

The aroma of freshly baked baklava wafting from the oven was irresistible, filling my kitchen with an intoxicating scent that seemed to transport me straight to the bustling streets of Istanbul. As we took our first bites, the layers of phyllo and nuts shattered in our mouths, releasing a burst of sweetness and flavor that left us both speechless.

We decided to let the baklava rest overnight before serving, as this allowed the flavors to meld together and the syrup to absorb into the dough. When I cut into the baklava the next day, it was clear that we had achieved something truly special – a delicate balance of sweet and savory flavors, crunchy textures, and aromatic spices that left us both wanting more.

For those looking to try their hand at making baklava, I highly recommend giving this recipe a shot. Don't be discouraged if your first attempt doesn't turn out perfectly – as with any traditional dessert, practice makes perfect, and the end result will be well worth the effort. And remember, the key to making great baklava lies in the layers – so take your time, enjoy the process, and don't be afraid to experiment with different flavors and ingredients until you find the combination that works best for you.

**The Recipe: Sisley Baklava**

If you'd like to try making this recipe yourself, here are some final tips and notes:

* Make sure to use a high-quality phyllo dough that's fresh and not too dry.

* Use a combination of pistachios and walnuts for added texture and flavor contrast.

* Don't be afraid to experiment with different spices and flavors – rose water is a great addition, but feel free to try other options like orange blossom or cinnamon.

* Let the baklava rest overnight before serving – this allows the flavors to meld together and the syrup to absorb into the dough.

And that's it! With these simple steps and a little bit of patience, you'll be enjoying your very own delicious baklava in no time. Happy baking!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: entoday we're gonna make baklava everyone's favorite middle eastern dessert baklava is layers of phyllo dough with nuts and butter and all that good stuff and then we usually pour with some kind of simple syrup or honey over top of it we're gonna start off by making a simple syrup so i'm doing one cup of sugar one cup of water i'm gonna dissolve this there's many variations of baklava but it really originated in the eighth century sometime around the ottoman empire i'm going to do kind of a persian variation of this meaning that i'm going to infuse my simple syrup with some saffron so you know just a nice little dime bag of saffron here all of these little tiny threads saffron threads are hand picked from the crocus flower and rose water use a lot in persian cuisine rose water is literally just infusing rose petals into water and then straining it's so floral and like using it in the simple secret it makes it so delicious really classing it up over here in the cooking show today i can hear my sugar is melted drop it on them and then i'm going to add the rose water to it as well after it infuses for about 30 minutes we're gonna go a little nuts today that's right i grew up in an iranian household my dad being the iranian my mom's italian and we had a lot of bowls of pistachios around but my dad always eats walnuts for breakfast with his big one cream cheese so for me i definitely want to use walnuts instead of almonds and dates haven't been on one of those nobel have i oh kova thanks a lot need to make sure we pit them i'm going to roughly chop these guys we're going to grind up our nuts you don't want to make this into like a fine paste or anything you want to find the ground but you're not trying to make a nut butter there's that word we all love again nut butter just put all these together in a little bowl over here into our mixture we're also gonna put some cardamom and just like three tablespoons granulated sugar the cardamom is definitely an iranian kind of touch for me it's something really delicious and again it's like so fragrant it smells like tea put that there i wanted to order shelled pistachios they didn't have them so i got non-shelled pistachios and now i gotta show them all cause i didn't do it yesterday the secrets of shelling pistachios there's a couple for you a couple for the ball i had this whole idea that it'd be really fun to watch me show all these i really myself over the thing about shelling pistachios too is it kind of starts to hurt your thumbs last one i did it i'm gonna grind these on up too so they're nicely not too crazy look at that beautiful color too so i'm going to save some for decoration for the top okay the rest will go in the hole by the time you're done showing your pistachios your simple syrup is nicely uh infused with a saffron saffron threads wow it's just golden and gorgeous we're gonna start assembling this couldn't be easier okay you're making this little mixture you're melting some butter you got your simple sear back there and then you've got your store-bought feeler though sure you could make your own field dough but why there are some convenience products that they're there for you they're convenient for a reason this is a pounds worth of phyllo dough and it's so thin just layers and layers so you want to just be very careful it's very delicate i would recommend putting like a damp paper towel or cloth over top of it so it doesn't dry out and the cool thing about filo dough too is that it literally is exactly 13 inches by 18 inches so when you cut it in half it's exactly a 9x13 and that's the exact size of the pan that we're going to be making this in so see if you look at it exactly half so i'm going to just cut it in half now put that there i'm gonna roll this bad boy up and we can pre-freeze it you can see here we've got a ton of butter so i'm just going to butter the bottom of my 9x13 so you're just going to do layer of your feel at the bottom brush it with some more butter i'm going to do five layers of phyllo and then i'm going to do a third of the filling five more layers with butter in between each layer basically at the end of this we're gonna have four layers of phyllo and three layers of the nuts and if these tear a little bit it's not a big deal don't forget you're gonna have a lot of layers of this i didn't really love baklava a lot growing up it always just tasted a little bit too sweet to me this version of it that i've made i really enjoy so spread this into an even layer the old mixture make sure you get the dates evenly spread in there as well that's layer one a lot of times it's very traditional at the persian new year to have all these like sweets and stuff i feel like baklava is one of those things where it just shows a lot of love you know there's time there's effort there's love there's joy there's sadness there's many layers to it we're almost done the last two layers of filo the first layer is the hardest butter's the glue that binds everything it's the final layer can't use that can we okay look at that beautiful now we gotta cut it people will cut their baklavan to all different shapes and sizes i prefer to do a diamonds pattern it's a little bit more traditional and you know me i love tradition so in order to do that diamond pattern first i did this it was really hard i thought just diagonals like all the way across but ends up just being squares like that you go diagonal across and then straight down gonna go into the oven for five zero minutes the baklava is in the oven for about 50 minutes at 350. it's nice you can see it's golden super crispy and delicious i'm gonna pour the syrup over it you hear that i am gonna brush a little bit of it too because then i want to garnish with some more pistachios while the heat of the oven is off it'll still kind of bake into it ideally you'll let this rest overnight it'll taste so good tomorrow you hear that it sounds so crazy should you roast falls on an hour afterwards we're gonna do it now in the oven 10 minutes oven's off here we go i'm gonna take this little piece now again i encourage you to let this sit overnight i didn't do that because i didn't want to have to trace this so look at this oh man that looks good this is like the perfect amount of sweetness for me it's not cloyingly sweet it's very nutty it's got that rose water so it has a nice floralness to it i love the balance of the pistachios and the walnuts in here i'm going to be in the middle east i encourage you to go out there and try as many different kinds of baklava as possible because everyone's going to make it differently also try this get the recipe at the link below thank you guys so much i hope you guys like this sisley baklava three two thank you so much okaytoday we're gonna make baklava everyone's favorite middle eastern dessert baklava is layers of phyllo dough with nuts and butter and all that good stuff and then we usually pour with some kind of simple syrup or honey over top of it we're gonna start off by making a simple syrup so i'm doing one cup of sugar one cup of water i'm gonna dissolve this there's many variations of baklava but it really originated in the eighth century sometime around the ottoman empire i'm going to do kind of a persian variation of this meaning that i'm going to infuse my simple syrup with some saffron so you know just a nice little dime bag of saffron here all of these little tiny threads saffron threads are hand picked from the crocus flower and rose water use a lot in persian cuisine rose water is literally just infusing rose petals into water and then straining it's so floral and like using it in the simple secret it makes it so delicious really classing it up over here in the cooking show today i can hear my sugar is melted drop it on them and then i'm going to add the rose water to it as well after it infuses for about 30 minutes we're gonna go a little nuts today that's right i grew up in an iranian household my dad being the iranian my mom's italian and we had a lot of bowls of pistachios around but my dad always eats walnuts for breakfast with his big one cream cheese so for me i definitely want to use walnuts instead of almonds and dates haven't been on one of those nobel have i oh kova thanks a lot need to make sure we pit them i'm going to roughly chop these guys we're going to grind up our nuts you don't want to make this into like a fine paste or anything you want to find the ground but you're not trying to make a nut butter there's that word we all love again nut butter just put all these together in a little bowl over here into our mixture we're also gonna put some cardamom and just like three tablespoons granulated sugar the cardamom is definitely an iranian kind of touch for me it's something really delicious and again it's like so fragrant it smells like tea put that there i wanted to order shelled pistachios they didn't have them so i got non-shelled pistachios and now i gotta show them all cause i didn't do it yesterday the secrets of shelling pistachios there's a couple for you a couple for the ball i had this whole idea that it'd be really fun to watch me show all these i really myself over the thing about shelling pistachios too is it kind of starts to hurt your thumbs last one i did it i'm gonna grind these on up too so they're nicely not too crazy look at that beautiful color too so i'm going to save some for decoration for the top okay the rest will go in the hole by the time you're done showing your pistachios your simple syrup is nicely uh infused with a saffron saffron threads wow it's just golden and gorgeous we're gonna start assembling this couldn't be easier okay you're making this little mixture you're melting some butter you got your simple sear back there and then you've got your store-bought feeler though sure you could make your own field dough but why there are some convenience products that they're there for you they're convenient for a reason this is a pounds worth of phyllo dough and it's so thin just layers and layers so you want to just be very careful it's very delicate i would recommend putting like a damp paper towel or cloth over top of it so it doesn't dry out and the cool thing about filo dough too is that it literally is exactly 13 inches by 18 inches so when you cut it in half it's exactly a 9x13 and that's the exact size of the pan that we're going to be making this in so see if you look at it exactly half so i'm going to just cut it in half now put that there i'm gonna roll this bad boy up and we can pre-freeze it you can see here we've got a ton of butter so i'm just going to butter the bottom of my 9x13 so you're just going to do layer of your feel at the bottom brush it with some more butter i'm going to do five layers of phyllo and then i'm going to do a third of the filling five more layers with butter in between each layer basically at the end of this we're gonna have four layers of phyllo and three layers of the nuts and if these tear a little bit it's not a big deal don't forget you're gonna have a lot of layers of this i didn't really love baklava a lot growing up it always just tasted a little bit too sweet to me this version of it that i've made i really enjoy so spread this into an even layer the old mixture make sure you get the dates evenly spread in there as well that's layer one a lot of times it's very traditional at the persian new year to have all these like sweets and stuff i feel like baklava is one of those things where it just shows a lot of love you know there's time there's effort there's love there's joy there's sadness there's many layers to it we're almost done the last two layers of filo the first layer is the hardest butter's the glue that binds everything it's the final layer can't use that can we okay look at that beautiful now we gotta cut it people will cut their baklavan to all different shapes and sizes i prefer to do a diamonds pattern it's a little bit more traditional and you know me i love tradition so in order to do that diamond pattern first i did this it was really hard i thought just diagonals like all the way across but ends up just being squares like that you go diagonal across and then straight down gonna go into the oven for five zero minutes the baklava is in the oven for about 50 minutes at 350. it's nice you can see it's golden super crispy and delicious i'm gonna pour the syrup over it you hear that i am gonna brush a little bit of it too because then i want to garnish with some more pistachios while the heat of the oven is off it'll still kind of bake into it ideally you'll let this rest overnight it'll taste so good tomorrow you hear that it sounds so crazy should you roast falls on an hour afterwards we're gonna do it now in the oven 10 minutes oven's off here we go i'm gonna take this little piece now again i encourage you to let this sit overnight i didn't do that because i didn't want to have to trace this so look at this oh man that looks good this is like the perfect amount of sweetness for me it's not cloyingly sweet it's very nutty it's got that rose water so it has a nice floralness to it i love the balance of the pistachios and the walnuts in here i'm going to be in the middle east i encourage you to go out there and try as many different kinds of baklava as possible because everyone's going to make it differently also try this get the recipe at the link below thank you guys so much i hope you guys like this sisley baklava three two thank you so much okay\n"