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Pistachio Esh El Asfoor & Walnut Burma

There's a version of this you can buy. There's also a version where you spend a day with your mother-in-law learning how. They are not the same thing.
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There’s a version of this you can buy. There’s also a version where you spend a day with your mother-in-law learning how. They are not the same thing.

Ingredients

The Base

  • 1 whole box phyllo dough
  • 2 sticks butter — one for the pan, one melted for the top
  • Crushed pistachios, for the top

Walnut Burma Filling

  • 2 cups walnuts, crushed
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 Tbsp cardamom
  • 2 Tbsp rose water

Pistachio Esh El Asfoor Filling

  • 1½ cups pistachios
  • 2 Tbsp honey

The Shira

  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 cup water

Instructions

Get Ready

  1. Make the fillings. For the burma, mix the walnuts with the sugar and cardamom, then stir in the rose water. For the Esh El Asfoor, mix the pistachios with the honey.
  2. Heat the oven. 300°F.
  3. Butter the pan. Rub one stick of butter over the bottom of the cookie sheet.
  4. Cut and cover the phyllo. Cut the phyllo in half and keep it under a damp cloth the entire time you work.

The Burma

  1. Roll. Take two sheets, fold them in half, lay the dowel across, and spread about 2 Tbsp of the walnut filling along it. Roll the phyllo around the dowel.
  2. Scrunch. Push the roll together along the dowel to crinkle it, slide the dowel out, and set it on the tray.

Esh El Asfoor

  1. Roll one sheet. Use a single sheet this time. Fold it over a little, fill it, and leave about an inch empty at the end. Roll it around the dowel.
  2. Shape the nest. Scrunch it together, slide the dowel out, then coil it into a circle like a little nest.
  3. Set the seam. Lay each nest with its seam against the piece next to it, so it cannot open up while it bakes.

Bake & Finish

  1. Butter the top. Melt the second stick and brush it generously over everything.
  2. Bake. 300°F for one full hour, low and slow.
  3. Shira. Boil the sugar and water together. Pour it over as soon as the pastries come out of the oven, as much as you like.
  4. Finish. Scatter crushed pistachios over the top.

The phyllo is the whole battle. It has to stay very hydrated — keep it under a damp cloth the entire time you work. A sheet that has dried out will crack, and a cracked sheet will not roll.