Recipe: The Old Guard's Black Sea Baklava
The Old Guard came out on Netflix over the summer, and I’m always happy to watch a movie where Charlize Theron gets to be a badass action star, but especially when I’m stuck inside and desperate for entertainment. The film follows the adventures of a group of immortal (well…near-immortal) warriors just as a new member is added to their ranks. And I actually enjoyed it more than once as Sugared Nerd contributor Casie and I decided to create a double feature of The Old Guard and the other summer streaming hit, Palm Springs (Hulu), for our podcast Movie Matchup.
One of my favorite parts of the movie was just how much love there was between all the members of The Old Guard. Obviously, living for hundreds and even thousands of years means that is would be difficult to form emotional attachments to other, non-immortal people, so it’s clear that this group really values each other as a family. Their comfort and familiarity with each other is demonstrated really well in an early scene where they make a bet over whether Charlize Theron’s character, Andy, can correctly identify the country of origin for a piece of baklava.
I’d never heard of using hazelnuts rather than walnuts for baklava, and Andy correctly uses this fact to narrow the location down to the Black Sea - the coastal region of the Black Sea is apparently flush with hazelnuts, so that’s their nut of choice in recipes. I figured the pomegranate and rose water she also identifies are most likely used in the syrup that this dessert is soaked in once it’s removed from the oven. Pomegranate molasses (or pomegranate syrup) is a pretty common ingredient in middle eastern cooking, so that’s what I used. I also went pretty easy on the rosewater. It’s not an ingredient I use much and I know it’s very easy to tip over into “I feel like I’m eating perfume” territory, but here it’s just lightly floral and sweet. If you don’t have these ingredients readily available to you, no worries. I discovered in my research that baklava has as many different recipes as people who make it, so feel free to leave those out, but maybe add a cinnamon stick as you’re cooking the syrup for a little extra flavor.
Baklava is a pretty labor-intensive dessert, but it is one of my favorites, and it’s absolutely worth making a tray of your own. It will keep at room temperature, under a piece of foil, for up to 10 days, and if you’re feeling generous you can even share some with your friends.
Andy’s Black Sea Baklava
Syrup
1 1/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup water
1/3 cup honey
1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp rosewater
2 tsp lemon juice (about half a lemon)
Baklava
12 oz. blanched hazelnuts
2 tbsp sugar
1 1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1/8 tsp salt
2 tsp cardamom
1 package frozen phyllo dough, thawed
1 cup melted ghee or clarified butter
To make the Syrup:
In a medium saucepan, combine the sugar, water, honey, pomegranate molasses, and salt. Stir to combine, and heat over medium-high until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture starts to thicken. Remove from heat and add the rosewater and lemon juice. Stir, then set aside to cool.
Syrup can be made a day ahead and kept in the fridge. Bring to room temperature before using.
To make the Baklava:
In the bowl of a food processor, pulse your hazelnuts until finely ground. Transfer nuts to a medium bowl, then set aside 2 tbsp of the ground nuts for topping your baklava later. To the rest of the nuts, add your sugar, cinnamon, cloves, salt and cardamom and stir to combine.
Preheat oven to 300°F.
To assemble your baklava, first lay out your phyllo sheets under a sheet of plastic wrap and a damp towel, for weight. Brush bottom and sides of a 9”x13” pan (not non-stick) with melted butter. Lay out a sheet of phyllo dough in the pan, then brush with melted butter until lightly coated. Repeat this process until you have 8 sheets of phyllo dough with butter between each sheet.
Top your 8th buttered sheet with a cup of your sugar & spice nut mixture. Distribute the nuts evenly with your hands, then layer another sheet of phyllo dough on top of it. Careful brush the melted butter onto this sheet, as it may shift and fold more easily. Then repeat with another 5 sheets, for a total of 6 sheets of phyllo dough. Ad another 1 cup of nuts, evenly distributed, then another 6 sheets of phyllo, as before. Top with the last of the nuts, and another 8 sheets of phyllo dough. If there’s any melted butter left after your final sheet, you can pour it out on top of the phyllo and brush to evenly distribute.
So, for a quick summary, your assembly will be: 8, nuts, 6, nuts, 6, nuts, 8
Using a serrated knife and short sawing motion, cut your baklava from one corner of your pan, diagonally down to the opposite corner. Along parallel lines, cut each section you just made in half, then each of those four sections in half again. Flip your pan and do the same from the opposite side, until you have fairly evenly-sized diamond shapes.
Bake your baklava for 1 hour and 30 minutes, turning the pan halfway through.
Remove the pan from the oven and immediately top with your syrup mixture. Aim for the cuts in the dough at first - your top layer of flaky pastry will be less likely to shift. Once all the seams have been filled you can pour the rest of the syrup directly on top of the baklava, creating a sticky surface so that you can top each piece with a pinch of the ground hazelnuts that we set aside earlier.
Now’s the hard part - in order for the syrup to soak through thoroughly, you must wait. Allow the baklava to cool, then top with aluminum foil and let sit for 8 hours. Maybe watch a movie, maybe two, then listen to a podcast about those two movies. Then when you can’t take the waiting anymore, dive in and enjoy.