Kunafa

Ingredients

Quantities for 10 servings.

• 500 g Kataifi pastry
• 700 g Akkawi or mozzarella, unsalted
• 250 g Ghee
• 400 g Sugar
• 250 ml Water
• 1 piece Lemon
• 1 tbsp Rose water
• 1 tbsp Orange blossom water
• 100 g Pistachios
• 1 pinch Orange food colouring, optional

Method

1. Boil a syrup of sugar, water and lemon juice for ten minutes, take it off, add the flower waters and cool it completely.
2. Soak salted cheese in cold water for two hours, changing it three times, and cut it into cubes.
3. Pull the kataifi apart into separate strands by hand and shorten them with scissors.
4. Pour the melted ghee over the pastry and rub it through with your hands until every strand glistens.
5. Press half the pastry into a greased tin, spread the cheese short of the edges and cover with the other half.
6. Bake at 190 °C for forty minutes to a deep gold underneath — check by lifting an edge with a spatula.
7. Turn it out onto a platter, pour the cold syrup over at once and scatter with ground pistachios.