Source: Bonnie White
Ingredients
- 2 sticks margarine
- 16 ounces walnuts, finely chopped
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- Pinch of cloves
- 1 package of Phyllo dough sheets, defrosted
- 8 ounces honey
Instructions
Melt margarine and set aside. In a separate bowl, mix together walnuts, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves.
Unfold phyllo and divide sheets into three approximately equal stacks. Cover the bottom of a 9″ x 13″ baking pan with margarine, spreading it around with a pastry brush for full coverage. Place the first stack of phyllo sheets in the pan and press down ad the corners so the edges go up the sides. Cut the remaining two stacks in half – you should now have four piles of half sheets.
Start layering the baklava in this order:
- Margarine (spread with pastry brush)
- 1 cup of the nut filling
- 1 pile of phyllo sheets
Repeat these layers four times, ending with the phyllo. You should use up the filling, but have extra margarine at the end.
Cut the baklava into trapezoid shapes almost to the bottom. Pour the remaining margarine over the whole thing and brush it evenly across the top – as it seeps down it will effectively coat every layer. With scissors, trim the overhanging phyllo around the edges.
Bake at 325° to 350° for 1 hour and 25 minutes, until baklava is golden brown. Remove from the oven. Warm honey in the microwave to a thin, pourable consistency. Pour it over the entire baklava to cover and seep down the cuts. Let cool to room temperature, then cut all the way through and serve.
Glenda’s
Secrets of Success
- I only use Fleishmann’s Original (unsalted) margarine. In the past I tried it with real butter and it seemed too rich to me. You can, of course, experiment with butter or margarine
- Don’t waste your time buttering each sheet of phyllo individually; just butter the top of the stack and the margarine will seep down.
- Don’t worry at all about exact measurements when you put the layers together. No one can ever tell if there are more nuts in the top half or the piles of phyllo are not even. Once it bakes, it all seems to work out. The only important thing is to work fast once the phyllo is out. Classic recipes say to keep the unused portion covered with a damp towel. I have everything ready and put it together in just a few minutes, so it doesn’t have time to dry out.
- Before baking, slice the baklava part-way through into trapezoids by cutting parallel slices across the pan in the long direction, then parallel lines at a 45° angle across the short sides. Once the baklava has cooked and cooled down, cut all the way through to the bottom to separate the pieces. I generally cut the pieces in half again, as well.
“Efficiency is intelligent laziness.”
David Dunham
Cooking with the Claremons 
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