Baklava or as pronounced in Arabic as “baklawa” is one of the most famous desserts from the Middle East. I have not met anyone yet who does know this dessert. There are many middle eastern desserts, but this one has made it many years ago on the wall of fame. There is no doubt about it, it is one of the most delicious mouth watery dessert. It simply dissolves in your mouth, if made right 🙂

Each country has its own version again of this one. Some stuff the buttery layers of Fillo dough with pistachios, others with walnuts, others with cream or even plain. Baklava could be covered with honey, sugar syrup or sugar syrup with some rose water flavors. They also come in different shapes as in triangles, quadrilaterals or rolls. Egyptians rarely make the baklava at home, since it is pretty affordable, tasty and everywhere in the sweet shops ready to be delivered .

Today I am making the homemade version of the baklava stuffed with cream. For easiness, I am making the simple shapes as shown below.

Ingredients
1 wrap of Fillo dough
1 cup of melted butter
Cream Stuffing Ingredients
2 cups of full fat milk
1/4 cup of heavy whipping cream.
1/2 cup of sugar
4 tbsp corn starch
1 tsp vanilla
Sugar Syrup Ingredients
1 1/2 cup of sugar
1 cup of water
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp lime juice

Make sure you have some melted butter ready. I use clarified butter melted on the stove top:

Let’s start with the cream filling first.
Mix the 4 tbsp of corn starch in the 1/4 cup of heavy whip cream.
In a medium pot on medium heat, bring the milk, corn starch mix, vanilla and sugar to boil.
Keep stirring slowly.
When it starts to boil and thickens, simmer down for few minutes.

Take off heat and set aside in a bowl in the fridge to cool down.

Then, we will work on the sugar syrup since it needs to be in room temperature when poured on the hot baked baklava.

Add the water, sugar and vanilla in a pot on medium heat.
Bring to boil for 10 minutes.
Add the lime juice.
Simmer down for another 10 minutes.

Now for the fillo dough layers:
Note: Fillo dough sheets could get hard and breakable if exposed to air for long time, so make sure to cover the sheets in the packet wrap while working with other sheets. Basically, we will work with half of the sheets, add the stuffing then add the other half. Each sheet should be very well brushed with the melted butter as demonstrated below.

In a pyrex or any other baking dish, brush its bottom with melted butter.
Add one layer of fillo dough and brush it with the melted butter.

Keep doing so and brush with melted butter each single sheet until you reach half the packet.
Add the cooled down cream and spread over the fillo dough layer.

Add one layer of fillo dough sheet on the top of the cream and brush with melted butter.
Keep doing so again and brush each sheet with the melted butter until you finish the full packet.

Carefully, with a sharp knife, cut diagonal lines as below.

Then cut across the diagonals another set of straight cuts.

In 370 degrees F. oven, bake until golden brown. It takes around 30 minutes.

As soon as it gets out, pour the room temperature sugar syrup on the top of it.
Do not separate or cut in the serving plate until it is fully cooled down.
Enjoy with a cup of tea with mint.