Double Nut Baklava

Week 514, and the dark arriving early, the kitchen warm against the cold, the soups simmering, the bread rising. I am 68 years old and the days have a rhythm now — the morning writing, the afternoon visits to Cedarhurst, the evening cooking, the weekly blog post — and the rhythm is the structure, and the structure is the sanity, and the sanity is required because the rest of it, the losing and the loving and the carrying, requires a sane woman at the helm, and I am sane, mostly, except when I cry in the car in the Cedarhurst parking lot, which is not insanity but its opposite: the specific, targeted release of emotion in a contained space, which is the most rational thing I do all week.

Rosh Hashanah 5787; sweet year prayer; honey on challah; plate to Marvin. These are the facts of the week, the data points, the things I would put in a report if I were writing a report, which I am not — I am writing a life, and the life includes the facts but is not limited to them, because the life also includes the way the kitchen smells at six in the morning when the coffee is brewing and the challah is rising and the house is quiet and the quiet is both the grief and the peace, simultaneously, and the simultaneous is the condition, the permanent condition of a woman who is 68 and alone and not alone, who is a grandmother and a wife and a writer and a cook and a caregiver and all of these things at once, always at once, braided together like the challah.

I made round challah and honey cake this week — because it was what the week needed, because the week always needs something and the something is always food, and the food is always the answer, and the answer is always the kitchen, and the kitchen is always mine, and the mine-ness of the kitchen is the one thing that has not changed in sixty-seven years of living, from Sylvia's kitchen on the Grand Concourse to this kitchen in Oceanside where I stand every morning and every evening and many of the hours in between, making the food that is the chain, that is the love, that is the thing I do when I don't know what else to do, which is always, and especially now.

I brought food to Marvin at the usual time. The visit was what visits are now — quiet, steady, the feeding by hand when necessary, the reading aloud always, the holding of the hand that may or may not know it is being held but that is warm and alive and present, which is the definition of love in this particular year: warm and alive and present. He ate what I brought. He received what I gave. The receiving is the relationship. The receiving is the vow. In sickness and in health, in recognition and in forgetting, in the recliner and in the kitchen, the receiving is the marriage, and the marriage continues, one container at a time, one visit at a time, one day at a time, at two o'clock, every day, because the chain does not break.

The honey cake and the round challah were already made, already carried, already received — and still the kitchen called me back, the way it always does, because one act of sweetness opens the door to another. Baklava is not a Rosh Hashanah tradition in my family, exactly, but honey is, and nuts are, and the slow patient layering of something beautiful is — and this week, after the parking lot and the hand-holding and the feeding and the vow, I needed to stand at the counter and build something, layer by layer, the way you build a year, the way you build a marriage, the way you build anything worth having. This is the recipe I made when the challah was gone and the prayer was still in me.

Prep Time: 30 minutes | Cook Time: 45 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes | Servings: 24 pieces

Ingredients

1 lb phyllo dough, thawed
1 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 cup walnuts, finely chopped
1 cup pistachios, finely chopped
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1 cup honey
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup granulated sugar (for syrup)
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Instructions

Prepare the nut filling. In a medium bowl, combine the chopped walnuts, chopped pistachios, 2 tablespoons sugar, cinnamon, and cloves. Stir until evenly mixed and set aside.
Preheat and prep the pan. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Generously brush a 9x13-inch baking dish with melted butter.
Layer the phyllo base. Lay one sheet of phyllo dough in the pan and brush it thoroughly with melted butter. Repeat with 7 more sheets, brushing each with butter, to form the base layer.
Add the first nut layer. Spread half of the nut mixture evenly over the phyllo base.
Build the middle layers. Layer 6 more sheets of phyllo over the nuts, brushing each sheet with melted butter as you go.
Add the second nut layer. Spread the remaining nut mixture evenly over the phyllo.
Top with final phyllo layers. Layer the remaining phyllo sheets on top, brushing every sheet with melted butter. Press down gently with your palms to compact the layers.
Score before baking. Using a sharp knife, cut the baklava into diamonds or squares all the way through the layers — approximately 24 pieces. This allows the syrup to soak in evenly after baking.
Bake. Bake at 350°F for 40–45 minutes, until the top is deep golden brown and the edges are crisp.
Make the honey syrup. While the baklava bakes, combine honey, water, 1/2 cup sugar, and lemon juice in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir until sugar dissolves, then bring to a gentle boil for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla extract. Allow to cool slightly.
Soak with syrup. As soon as the baklava comes out of the oven, pour the warm honey syrup slowly and evenly over the entire pan, following your scored cuts. You will hear it sizzle — that is the sound of the sweetness going in.
Rest before serving. Allow the baklava to cool completely at room temperature, uncovered, for at least 4 hours or overnight. The syrup will be fully absorbed and the layers will set. Serve at room temperature.

Nutrition (per serving)

Double Nut Baklava — The Sweetness We Carry Into the New Year