Recipe for :

This recipe has been reproduced with the kind permission of Samara Cuisine.

Based in Ham, South West London Samara Cuisine not only caters for all kinds of occasions, such as dinner parties, birthday parties, weddings, hen nights, Christmas parties, office parties, corporate functions and conferences but also teaches hands on cookery classes in Lebanese cuisine.

The classes are held in our Mediterranean garden, and in Winter the classes take place in our dining room over looking the Mediterranean garden, in front of a cosy fire.

Each class features three different Lebanese recipes, tips on how to preserve food, best places to shop, how to choose the ingredients, costs and the amount you need to prepare for different occasions. You can also join us, a day before on a shopping trip to the local market or the Arabic shops to introduce you to many new ingredients, and how to use them.

Each cooking session accommodates four people. Everyone prepares and helps to put together the meal and at the end of each session we all sit down with a bottle of Lebanese wine to sample the food.

All participants will take home a plate of Lebanese Baklava, a bag of Lebanese bread, all the recipes they tried and general cooking tips.

. . . like to know more about how to book a cooking class then visit www.samaracuisine.co.uk

Ingredients

Dough:
1 Cup of flour
1 Cup of milk
1 tsp yeast
1/2 tsp bicarbonate de soda

Filling:
1 Cup of walnut
2 tbsp of granulated sugar
1 tbsp rose water
Orange blossoms for decoration

Syrup:
1 Cup of sugar
1 Cup of water
2 tbsp of lemon juice
1 tbsp of rose water

Method

• Prepare the syrup first. Put all the ingredients in a small pan and stir until the sugar is dissolved. Put the pan on the hob at a high temperature and stir from time to time until the syrup is no longer watery. This will take around 10 minutes, leave aside to cool down.

• Whisk the flour, milk and yeast together and leave aside for 2 hours.

• When ready, use a big non-stick pan to cook the katayef. Heat the pan first and then reduce temperature to minimum.

• Sprinkle the bicarbonate de soda to the runny dough and mix.

• Take 2 big table spoons and pour in the pan in small circles to make a small size Katayef. Fry the katayef on one side until golden, remove and leave to cool down.

• Meanwhile, prepare the filling, wash the walnuts and put in a blender, add sugar and rose water, blend until smooth.

• Fill each katayef with one spoonful of walnuts and close the 2 sides together making a cone shape.

• When ready to serve the katayef sprinkle one teaspoon of syrup, and some Orange blossoms and serve.

• You can also deep fry the katayef if you wish and once out sprinkle with the syrup.

Samara Cuisine
www.samaracuisine.co.uk