Turkish Baklava

Place the walnuts on a baking sheet and bake in the preheated oven to 200 degrees C for about 10 minutes - just until they are slightly toasted.

Take care not to burn them.

Chop the walnuts, add the cinnamon, nutmeg and sugar. 

Mix to combine, this will be the walnut filling.

For this recipe I used a classic oven baking sheet.

Brush the sheet with melted butter.

Arrange 10 filo sheets, each of them greased with butter, in the sheet. If the sheets don't fit in the baking tray, cut the extra bits with the scissors.

Sprinkle with 1/3 walnut filling on top.

The next layer will be 6 filo sheets, all coated with butter. 

Spread over 1/3 walnut mixture.

Next, another 6 filo sheets greased with butter and 1/3 walnut filling on top.

At the end, top with 4 buttered filo sheets. Insist with the butter on the top layer. 

So: 10 filo sheets (+ walnuts) + 6 sheets (+ walnuts) + 6 sheets (+ walnuts) + 4 sheets.

Refrigerate for 40 minutes.

Meanwhile, we prepare the syrup:

- combine water with 300g sugar, and let simmer for about 10 minutes over low heat, optionally, you can add lemon juice at the end (I didn't).

Let cool completely until lukewarm, cold even.

Return baklava from the fridge and carefully cut a criss-cross pattern into the top layers.

Pour the remaining butter into the slits in the baklava.

Bake in the preheated oven to 180 degrees C for about 25-30 minutes.

While the baklava is in the oven, add the 5 tbsp honey to the syrup, mix until it dissolves.

As soon as baklava is done, remove from the oven and pour over the cold syrup. 

So, hot baklava + cold syrup.

Let cool completely and after that let sit in a cool place for 6-8 hours, the best would be in the fridge.

After this, it's ready to be served, syrupy and cold.

This is a closer shot, an even more convincing one, I hope :)

Enjoy!