Baklava Ice Cream With Honey Poached Figs Recipes

GREEK BAKLAVA

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F(175 degrees C). Butter the bottoms and sides of a 9x13 inch pan.
• Chop nuts and toss with cinnamon. Set aside. Unroll phyllo dough. Cut whole stack in half to fit pan. Cover phyllo with a dampened cloth to keep from drying out as you work. Place two sheets of dough in pan, butter thoroughly. Repeat until you have 8 sheets layered. Sprinkle 2 - 3 tablespoons of nut mixture on top. Top with two sheets of dough, butter, nuts, layering as you go. The top layer should be about 6 - 8 sheets deep.
• Using a sharp knife cut into diamond or square shapes all the way to the bottom of the pan. You may cut into 4 long rows the make diagonal cuts. Bake for about 50 minutes until baklava is golden and crisp.
• Make sauce while baklava is baking. Boil sugar and water until sugar is melted. Add vanilla and honey. Simmer for about 20 minutes.
• Remove baklava from oven and immediately spoon sauce over it. Let cool. Serve in cupcake papers. This freezes well. Leave it uncovered as it gets soggy if it is wrapped up.

BAKLAVA ICE-CREAM WITH HONEY POACHED FIGS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 200 degree C.
• Spread the nuts onto a baking tray and cook for about 10 minutes, just until the nuts are golden and toasted.
• Cool.
• Grease and line two 6 1/2 cm deep loaf pans.
• Stand ice cream at room temperature to soften, just so that it's workable-not melted.
• Roughly chop the cooled nuts.
• Add the cinnamon and sugar to the nuts and stir to combine.
• Place 1 litre of the ice-cream into each loaf pan and spread evenly.
• Sprinkle each with 1 cup of nut mixture.
• Top with the remaining litre of ice-cream in each pan and top each with the remaining nuts, pressing the nuts on so that they stick in the ice-cream.
• Wrap each pan with plastic wrap and then a layer of foil.
• Freeze for at least 6 hours or overnight.
• To make the honey figs bring the water, honey and cinnamon to the boil in a saucepan.
• Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
• Add the figs and cook another 15 minutes.
• Cool slightly, transfer to a container and refridgerate for at least 2 hours.
• To serve, slice the ice-cream and serve topped with some figs and drizzled with the syrup.

ROSIE'S BAKLAVA ICE-CREAM CAKE

Steps:

• With a sharp knife finely chop almonds and walnuts separately. (Resist the temptation to use a food processor; chopping by hand is the key to the texture of baklava.) In a bowl stir together nuts, sugar, and spices. Put stack of phyllo sheets on a work surface and cover with 2 overlapping sheets of plastic wrap and then a damp kitchen towel. Melt butter and keep warm. (If butter cools, it will be too thick to brush.)
• Preheat oven to 350°F.
• With a pastry brush brush a 17 1/2- x 12 1/2- x 1-inch baking pan with some butter. Cover bottom of pan with a phyllo sheet, keeping remaining sheets covered with plastic wrap and towel, and lightly brush with butter. Layer 7 more phyllo sheets, brushing each sheet with butter, in same manner. Sprinkle nut mixture over buttered phyllo and with your fingers gently spread evenly.
• On a work surface (not on top of nut layer) lightly butter and stack remaining 8 phyllo sheets, making sure top sheet is well-buttered. Transfer phyllo stack to baking pan, putting it on nut layer and pressing to help it adhere to nuts. With a fork prick top phyllo stack all over at 1/4-inch intervals going through to nut layer, to keep it from puffing unevenly. With sharp knife halve baklava crosswise and bake in middle of oven until golden brown, about 30 minutes.
• Make syrup while baklava is baking:
• Halve lemon half. In a 1 1/2-quart saucepan boil water, sugar, and lemon over moderate heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved and liquid is reduced to about 1 1/3 cups, about 10 minutes. Remove pan from heat and stir in honey. Discard lemon and cool syrup to warm.
• Pour warm syrup over hot baklava and cool in pan on a rack 15 to 30 minutes. (Baklava will absorb syrup.) Do not let baklava cool more than 30 minutes before assembling cake or phyllo layers will become too soft to transfer.
• While baklava is cooling, soften ice cream. (We softened ours in a microwave set on defrost, 30% power, 1 1/2 to 2 minutes. Alternatively, you can leave it in the refrigerator - not on the counter -30 minutes).
• Assemble cake:
• Using two 30-inch-long sheets of foil, line a 13- x 9- x 2-inch baking pan, arranging 1 sheet lengthwise and 1 sheet crosswise. With a large metal spatula carefully slide 1 baklava half into pan and top with ice cream, spreading evenly. Slide remaining baklava half over ice cream and wrap cake snugly in foil. Freeze cake at least 6 hours and up to 1 week.
• Just before serving, cut cake into pieces.