How to cook a simple baklava?

I occasionally cook baklava for friends and family. Although it looks complicated, it is quite simple and anybody can cook it easily, mostly because it is a simplified version of the real baklava recipe cooked in Turkey. Here is my "simple baklava" recipe...

Ingredients:

• 1 lbs pistachios or walnuts (without shells)
• # 7 thickness fillo-dough, size 12”x17”
• 3 cups of sugar
• 2.5 cups of water
• 2 sticks of butter
• Juice of half a lemon

1. Mix sugar and water in a pan and boil on high heat for about 12 minutes. Add lemon juice and boil half a minute more, than put the pan aside for cooling. This mixture is called serbet.
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. Finely grind the pistachios (or walnuts). You can use a small chopper for this purpose.
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. Put the ground pistachios aside.
   
   
   
   
   
4. Turn on your oven and set the temperature to 350F (convection, if available). The oven should be ready before you start placing fillo-dough layers in the tray.
   
5. Melt the butter (you can use your microwave), it should be totally liquid.
   
   
   
   
   
6. Use a baking tray of the same size of your fillo-dough for easy cooking. For this recipe, you can use a 12” x 17” tray.
   
   
   
   
   
7. If the tray is made of metal, cover the tray with aluminum foil. If you have glass tray, no need for covering.
   
   
   
   
   
8. Take fillo-dough sheets out of its package.
   
   
   
   
   
   
9. Place 12 fillo-dough sheets one-by-one on the bottom of the tray. If the sheets are larger than the tray, cut the extra pieces with a sharp knife. We will use these pieces later. Then, add about half of the ground pistachios on it, creating a thin, homogeneous layer.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
10. If you have some extra pieces of fillo-dough sheets left from the previous step, you can use them now to cover the layer of pistachios.
    
    
    
    
    
11. Place 4 fillo-dough sheets one-by-one on it. Then, add the reamining half of the ground pistachios on it, creating a thin, homogeneous layer. Be sure to leave a small amount of ground pistachios for final decoration.
    
    
    
    
    
    
12. Place the remaining fillo-dough sheets on it.
    
    
    
    
    
13. Using a sharp knife, cut the fillo-dough layers horizontal and perpendicular, creating small squares of size about 2.5” x 2.5”. You can actually give any rectangular shape you want at this stage. Make sure than all the layers are cut until the bottom of the tray.
    
    
    
    
    
14. Evenly pour the liquid butter on it, and be sure that no dry area left on the surface.
    
    
    
    
    
15. Immediately place the tray in the oven. Bake about 35-40 minutes. Check regularly after 30 minutes to be sure that your baklava is not burned.
    
    
    
    
    
16. The baklava should have a light brown, golden color when ready. Some parts of it may be darker brown, which is OK.
    
    
    
    
    
17. Remove the tray from the oven and using a sharp knife go over the borders of baklava squares to make sure that they are not connected to each other.
    
    
    
    
    
18. Immediately pour the sugar & water mix (serbet) on it. Pour most of the mix between the squares.
    
    
    
    
    
19. Sprinkle the remaining ground pistachios on and between the squares.
    
    
    
    
    
20. Let it cool down. Wait about at least 12 hours before eating.
    
    
    
    
    

Afiyet olsun!