Frozen Baklava
Cook Time 2.5 hours
Servings 8
Ingredients
1 packet of filo pastry
50g unsalted butter, melted
1 cup ground almonds
Ice Cream:
7 free range egg yolks
2 cups cream
1 cup full cream milk
½ cup castor sugar
2 cinnamon sticks, broken in half OR 2 tsps ground cinnamon
4 cardamom pods, bruised
1 tbs honey
2 tbs rosewater
2 tbs orange zest
1 tsp vanilla extract OR seeds from 1 vanilla pod
½ cup pistachios, chopped finely
Syrup:
1 cup water
½ cup castor sugar
2 tsps honey
2 cinnamon sticks, broken in half OR 2 tsps ground cinnamon
2 tbs rosewater
2 cardamom pods, bruised
1 orange, juiced
Method
To make ice cream
To make ice cream combine egg yolks and half the amount of sugar in a bowl and whisk until pale and creamy.
Combine all remaining ingredients in a medium sized pot, except for the pistachios, and place on low-med heat and allow the milk mixture to heat until almost boiling point. Remove from heat and allow ingredients to infuse for a further 5 mins.
Pour about half a cup of the warm milk mixture into the egg yolk mixture and whisk. Add remaining milk mixture into egg yolk mixture and whisk till combined.
Pour the mixture into a clean medium sized pot. On low-med heat stir with a flexible spatula or wooden spoon until mixture thickens slightly. You can test this on the back of a wooden spoon, run a line down the back of the spoon and if the mixture does not run it is ready.
Cool mixture in fridge or whisk over a bowl of ice.
Churn mixture in an ice cream machine according to the manufacturers instructions, and then fold through chopped pistachios. Line a small shallow baking tray with plastic wrap, add the ice cream mixture to this and freeze till solid.
Alternatively if you don’t have an ice cream machine, line a small shallow baking tray with plastic wrap, fold chopped pistachios through ice cream mixture then add this to the baking tray and whisk every few hours, ensuring you smooth out the ice cream so it’s like a rectangle block.
To make pastry
Preheat fan-forced oven to 150 degrees
To make pastry, take one sheet of store-bought filo pastry and brush one side with melted butter then sprinkle over ground almonds, fold the filo pastry onto itself so that you have a square. Brush the top of this sheet of filo with melted butter, sprinkle with ground almonds, top with a square of filo.
Repeat this process until you have a square of filo with about 8 layers. The top layer shouldn’t have any butter or ground almonds on top of it.
Cut the square of filo into small triangles
Place filo triangles on baking tray lined with baking paper and bake for about 20 minutes. Keep a close eye on them; they should be a nice golden colour when you take them out. Whilst they are baking you can make the syrup.
Once cooked, remove from oven and using a pastry brush, coat each triangle heavily in syrup, allow to cool slightly before adding ice cream.
To make syrup
To make syrup combine all ingredients in a small or medium sized pot and place over high heat until the liquid becomes thick and syrupy
To assemble
Remove ice cream from the baking tray and remove plastic wrap. Cut ice cream into the same size triangles as the filo pastry.
Take one filo triangle and top with ice cream, top ice cream with filo, top with ice cream and then a final layer of filo. You can also make single layered baklavas.
