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last night was very delicious, so delicious, our friend Chris dropped by after work to join us/mooch off our hard work. for a few days, ariel and i have been toying with the idea of making baklava and decided that yesterday we might as well go for it. i also made two types of palmiers, one batch of orange zest for my little sister's friend and another batch with the leftover walnuts from the baklava.
we used that nifty thing called google and searched "baklava easy" and used the first recipe that appeared (link). in the nut mixture, we used walnuts, almonds, and pine nuts, though pistachios would have been way more authentic (the local supermarket did not have them and we did not want to drive to the "nearest" trader joe's). also amidst making the syrup, i realized i didn't have any vanilla extract. oops. the only hassle to this desert is the layering of the dough, butter, and nut mixture. best when done by two or more people. the only thing i think we had an issue with at the end was that there wasn't enough syrup. ariel's vivid imagination made her think the baklava would be swimming in syrup. though that was not the case, a little more syrup would have added to the overall dish.
next we made the palmiers. this has got to be the easiest and classiest cookie with the most possibilities. why waste your time with lame and boring chocolate chip cookies from the can when you can just defrost a sheet of puff pastry, spread your favorite filling, roll it, cut it, then bake it! really... that is all there is to it.
orange zest palmiers
1 sheet of puff pastry
1 cup of sugar
1 tbsp of orange zest (half an orange)
preheat oven at 400 degrees. sugar the surface you are going to place the pastry on. roll out defrosted puff pastry at 1 inch per side. i suggest covering the rolling pin with sugar (a cookie could never have too much sugar!). lightly sprinkle sugar and orange zest all over the pastry. take one side and roll the entire length until you reach the middle. do the same for the opposite side. make sure it is tightly rolled! wrap the roll in plastic wrap and stick it in the refrigerator for about 1 hour, or the freezer for about 20 minutes.
take the roll out, unwrap, and with a good knife, cut out each cookie at 1/2 inch thick. place on the baking sheet at about and inch to an inch and a half depending how large these cookies are. then they are ready to bake! just pop them in the oven for 9-11 minutes or until golden brown. be careful! these babies burn fast!
the walnut palmiers are very similar but instead of orange zest, we shaved walnuts, sprinkled sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg over the dough. next time ariel and i decide to make these, we want to play around with more flavoring. blackberry? cherry jam? any suggestions?
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