Honey Baklava with Meyer Lemons

Baklava is one of those pastries that bring back many memories. When Thomas and I lived in Berlin, there were many neighborhood shops that sold freshly made baklava. Occasionally we treated ourselves to a piece or two. The honey you choose to use for a recipe such as a baklava, really imparts a lot of taste. Therefore making it even more important that you use super tasty honey! ;-) 

Our friend Regina developed this recipe for us! 

Ingredients for the syrup:

• ⅓ cup of water
• ½ cup of Brazilian Acacia - Angico  (Buy it on Amazon)
• 2 tbsp Meyer lemon juice

Baklava:

• About ¾ of 16 oz package of phyllo dough
• 1 ¼ cup pecans
• 1 ¼ cup hazelnuts
• Zest from two Meyer lemons
• Juice from one Meyer lemon
• ¼ cup Medjool dates pitted
• ⅛ cup of water
• ½ jar of Brazilian Acacia - Angico
• About 2 tbsp pistachios, chopped
• About ½ cup of unsalted butter, melted

Directions:

1. To make the syrup, put the pot with water, honey Meyer lemon juice on a stove on medium heat and gently bring to a boil. Turn the heat on low and simmer for about 5 minutes, until the syrup coats the back of a spoon. Cool it down.
2. Place the nuts, dates, zest, and juice of Meyer lemons and honey in a food processor.
3. Process the mixture until it sticks together. Add some water, 1 tbsp at a time, if the mixture is too dry.
4. Preheat the oven at 350F.
5. Trim the phyllo dough for your baking sheet. Grease the bottom and sides of a baking sheet with a small amount of butter. Cover phyllo dough with damp towels and keep them covered all the time. Put the first sheet of phyllo and brush with butter. Don’t add too much butter on each sheet of dough, otherwise, it will be soggy. Put 7 layers of phyllo dough, brushed with butter each of it. Next, put half of the nut honey mixture on top.
6. Repeat laying phyllo dough sheets, brushing with a small amount of butter. The more layers, the better. I put 6 more layers of phyllo dough, the rest of the nut honey mixture and finished it with 7 more layers of phyllo dough. Cut the baklava before baking. You can cut your desired way.
7. Bake baklava for 35-45 minutes or until the top is golden brown. Immediately brush with cold honey syrup, while it’s hot. Sprinkle chopped pistachios and some extra lemon zest. Cool it down before serving.