As some of you know, I am frequently a guest on the syndicated show Daytime. While I was taping my infamous Christmas Tree segment, Lindsay asked if I would be interested in coming on and making baklava. Well, of course I didn’t hesitate to say yes, it’s always so much fun hanging out with Lindsay, Cyndi, Dave, Rob, Larry, April and the whole gang. Definitely never a dull moment with them!

So, after I accepted the invitation, I realized that I had never made baklava. Kinda important to be able to know how to do something if you’re going to go onto national television to explain how to do it! Although this was going to be a segment following a story Lindsay did on Istanbul….and by the way WOW, it’s now on my list of must do’s!, but I took the opportunity to reflect on our trip to Greece that Barry and I had done while living in Italy. While in Mykonos, Barry went on a quest for the world’s best baklava. Needless to say we tasted our fair share of this decadent dessert. We actually found a little boutique café with the world’s largest variations of baklava I had ever seen, more on that later, I’m in the process of trying some variations myself. Then I remembered a couple of months ago while doing a boot camp at the Culinary Institute of America one of the dishes prepared was baklava. Then I recalled how sinfully good it was, so I went and dug into the recipes that we were sent home with. Fortunately, the baklava recipe was one that I did manage to make it home with. The Culinary's recipe is posted on Epicurious.com. Click here for the recipe, which by the way consistently gets rave reviews as the best baklava ever! It is not difficult in terms of technique, but do allow yourself about 2.5 hours to make. If you are doing this for serving guests, also allow time for it to cool, it must be served at room temperature.

If you aren’t able to watch the segment on Monday, January 11 then make sure to go their website at http://www.daytimeonline.tv/ for a recap of the show. – Debbie