How Should Good Baklava Taste? 

When we want to see dessert on the table in our most beautiful and special moments, holidays, events, the first thing that comes to our mind is baklava. Baklava is a traditional Middle Eastern dessert made from puff pastry filled with chopped nuts and topped with sugar or honey. It is possible to find baklava in many places around us, but most of the time we cannot choose the best and highest quality baklava. As “Ramzioğlu Baklava”, today we will share with you how to understand baklava best.

Smell is one of the most important nuances in food selection. There is a direct connection between the olfactory receptors in the human body and the nervous system. Some flavors look great, but they can have an unpleasant smell. Therefore, the smell of food creates a feeling of discomfort in the brain. No matter how good the food looks, many of us have faced situations where it is not preferred because of its smell. A good baklava should not only look good, but also have a special smell like clarified butter and peanuts.

When we choose sweets, we first pay attention to the appearance, then we decide. That's why all restaurants or sweets places try to take the best picture of the food or dessert and convey it to their customers, because when we choose, we often decide based on the appearance. But if you ask what good baklava looks like, of course, good baklava should be roasted like a pomegranate and golden yellow in color.

The dough of a good baklava should be thinly rolled out and fully baked. If you hear a hissing sound when you dip the fork into the baklava, it means that it is of good quality. This sound indicates that the baklava dough is thin and fully cooked.

One of the important factors in choosing a food is the effect it leaves when you touch it. A good baklava should melt easily in the mouth. Sometimes sweets fall apart or become hard when you touch them, which can leave you with a negative impression. The touch also gives a clue as to how the dessert is cooked. Perfectly baked baklava does not fall apart when touched. 

The taste of good baklava does not irritate the throat. When you eat baklava, the front part of the tongue senses the taste, and only when the sugar in good baklava matches its full flavor does it have a delicious effect. Baklava should have a stable amount of sugar and should not leave a feeling of excess on the palate. In addition, good baklava does not cause a burning sensation in the throat and stomach.

The Importance of Staff in Baklava Preparation

Since it is a highly skilled and time-consuming process, the labor involved in its preparation is very important for the quality and taste of baklava. The phyllo dough must be carefully prepared, rolled, folded with the filling, and the finished dough must be carefully baked to achieve the perfect appearance and taste. Without the skillful hands and years of experience of baklava makers, the traditional dessert would not exist today.

Although factors such as soil, water and weather conditions are not required for baklava, experience is important when making this dessert. You can feel it when you first taste the baklava made by skilled and experienced craftsmen. What type of flour to use, the preparation and shaping of the dough, the sugar content, the amount of nuts - all this leads to the appearance of a good baklava. Experienced craftsmen who speak in this field have been making baklava for years and have learned all the basic techniques of baklava making.

Importance of Ingredients Used in Baklava Preparation

Making good baklava requires not only skill, but also quality ingredient selection. Let's take a look at the products and techniques needed to make good baklava:

• • The flour you will use for baklava must be of good quality and for baklava.

• • The oil you will use for baklava should be of good quality and oil for baklava.

• • The consistency of the syrup is very important for baklava. It should be cooked for about 35-40 minutes.

• • After preparing baklava, it should be baked in a stone-based oven at 200 degrees for 40-45 minutes.

• • If you are rolling the dough by hand, the consistency should be loose, if you are going to roll the dough by machine, the consistency should be firmer.

• • "What kind of starch is used to open baklava?" if you're asking the question, the key here is to open it with good powdered wheat or cornstarch.

• • When rolling out the baklava layers, a lot of starch should be sprinkled between them, but when expanding and rolling into the dough, sprinkle only as much starch as is necessary for the dough.

• • When rolling out the baklava dough, a large baklava rolling device should be used and a draft-free, room-temperature environment should be preferred.

The biggest reason why the baklava dough is not the desired softness is that the filo dough is not rolled thin enough. If you use thinly rolled filo and pour hot syrup over the hot dessert, the baklava dough will be very soft. To avoid this, you need to have a paper-thin rolled out phyllo dough. Along with the best quality products, knowing the right techniques comes in handy here.

While preparing the baklava syrup, the sugar is stirred until it dissolves, but after the sugar has dissolved, it is not touched again. Otherwise, the sugar will cut and the syrup will be much thicker than it should be. This makes the baklava doughy. When the baklava is ready, when you take a slice, the syrup in the baklava should not drip.

Under What Conditions Should Baklava Be Stored?

Since baklava is a difficult dessert, despite being prepared very often, it is not always possible to use it on the day it is made. It is also very important to properly and properly store the labor-intensive baklava after its preparation. Now let's take a look at how to keep the baklava together:

Since baklava is a dessert with a lot of sugar, it is not recommended to keep it in the refrigerator. Because baklava placed in the refrigerator turns into sugar faster. In fact, baklava stored in the refrigerator does not taste good and its sugar concentration increases. Instead, you can store it in a dry and cool environment for 3-5 days. If baklava is stored in a sunny and humid place, it will spoil very quickly. Since dry baklava does not contain syrup, it can be stored in a dry and cool environment for much longer than baklava with syrup.

Since it is a labor-intensive preparation process, it is very important to be able to store this delicious dessert under optimal conditions for a long time.

As we always say, making good baklava requires skill and a lot of practice. You can prepare the best baklava by paying attention to these points.