Making Baklava is easier than you think. Here’s a fun way to explore the world with food with your child and a yummy baklava recipe.
I wish we had enough money to take our children to Greece, but let’s be honest with 3 kids, one in college and the others 2 and 6 years old add to that a Hardworking Dad and a Stay at Home Mom we’ll probably never get the chance to afford that trip. So we decided on the next best thing… we packed up our bags and headed to a local town that is known for it’s Greek Culture. We took a trip to Tarpon Springs, Florida.
We discovered this adorable town full of delicious restaurants and a working sponge dock that attracts tourists from all over. I was so surprised when we got out of the car the air was filled with the smell of homemade soap. Quite a special smell right next to the sea. I’ve always wanted to learn how to make my own soap, a dear friend Vanessa at The Crafty Gemini always shares the best ideas she has a tutorial on how to make your own soap , even a video!.
While we were there we had to stop at a local Restaurant that everyone recommends called Hella’s. It did not disappoint it was so much fun with our girls! With a beautifully designed Greek interior, Greek music and food that was amazing! Our trip was not complete without a stop at the Bakery when we were done. We bought a small box of Baklava. We encourage you check out your area and see if you have any Greek Communities or Restaurants, exploring them with children can be a tiny mini vacation and exposure to world culture. We have quite found memories of trips over the years to San Francisco and Detroit and local restaurants and communities we discovered there.
Once we arrived at home, I asked my daughter which was her favorite from the trip and Baklava was the first thing that came out of her mouth. We decided to try our own attempt at making it. First we gathered our ingredients together after printing off the recipes from All Recipes. Then we watched a video of how to make it.
Videos for how to make Baklava
It’s simple process that truthfully my 6 year old was able to do most of the tasks herself. It’s such a confidence boost to as she creates her own dishes. Plus the whole time she’s reading and practicing math with measurements, LOVE IT. The steps were simple… dough, butter,dough butter, then nuts, and again dough, Butter, just follow the recipe. She even used the mixer to chop the nuts and I removed them so she would avoid the sharp edges. I had three adult jobs to lay down the dough sheets, cut the diagonal lines to form the pieces and cook & pour the syrup with her assistance.
While it was baking we mixed together sugar, honey and vanilla to make the syrup that you pour over the pastry once it’s cooked. You can see from the image above she couldn’t wait to pour the syrup over the baklava, it smelled so good! This turned out to be a big hit at our house and was absolutely delicious.
Truthfully I can’t wait to explore making more Greek Recipes with her. We love making our own hummus together, again she helps with the blender. The next one we want to try is this recipe for Feta and Spinach Couscous Patties. What Greek dish is your favorite?
Around the World in 12 Dishes
We started our journey the same way Phileas Fogg did in London, UK, and now are arriving in Athens, capital of Greece! Check out where we’ve traveled so far on our Cooking Around the World.
United Kingdom ~ Sweden ~ Russia ~ India ~ Japan ~ Australia ~ French Polynesia ~ Mexico
The world is such a wonderfully diverse and colorful place. Our children see maps, flags and books. They see postcards and maybe they see films about the world.. but let’s really bring it to life through food! Taste and smell don’t often get explored, we think this would be wonderfully fun and interesting for you and your children. Not only is it an exciting and different way to learn about cultures, but cooking with children brings a host of benefits – from numeracy to science. How can you beat that?
Adventures In Mommydom, Creative Family Fun, Domestic Goddesque, Glittering Muffins, Here Come The Girls, Juggling with Kids, Kid World Citizen, Kitchen Counter Chronicles, Mermaids’ Makings, Montessori Tidbits, Mummymummymum and The Educators’ Spin On It have come together to help you on your food journey and will each cook a dish with our children and post about it – to help inspire you to have a go! Then go out there, cook, blog, and join in the linky fun! Check out the other great posts as well!
How to join the fun!
- The only mandatory part is the dish, the rest is all up to you, we just thought it would be fun and more concrete to the kids as to why we are making a unusual dish.
- Cook a dish from Greece: The goal is to explore this country through FOOD and activities if you wish. Make a typical dish (sweet or savoury) from the country with the kids, take photos and have fun!
- Typical dishes: Gyros, Souvlaki, Spanakopita, Baklava.
- Print your passport: Click here to download, comes with space for a photo of the child with the dish. Here is a little cover for it if you wish 🙂
- Color a placemat: Once colored/painted or whatever other way you want to do this, you can laminate it or put it between clear contact paper to use it over and over. Great conversation piece for you and your kids. Click here to download it.
- Make a craft: you can make a country related craft with the kids [optional!]
- Fun fact: Santa Claus is Greek. St Nicholas was a rich Greek that used to donate his money to the poor.
- Share with us: Our Greek challenge starts on January 13th and will remain open for a year, so attach a link to your blog to enter the linky party or go to the comment section and post a photo together with what you did together with your child(ren).
- Pinterest: We will add your photos to a “Around the World in 12 Dishes” Pinterest Boards (one for the dishes, one for the crafts) you will be a great source of inspiration for everyone 🙂
- Are you a blogger? Let your fans know about the challenge and grab our cute lil’ button to share it on your blog.
If you do this, we’d LOVE to see a photo of it. Email it to us or post it on our Facebook page.
Please link up your Greek dish and/or craft in our linky below, we would love to see it!
I adore baklava, I don't adore the sugar rush headache that comes from eating it though. You are so brave to make it………..
Didn't you say you were bringing me a piece???? Looks sooo yummy!!!!! – Amanda
That was such a good idea to go to a Greek community to explore it! Much less expensive than the real thing 🙂 LOVE that you both get so much out of this project, makes me very happy! Thanks for participating again 🙂
This looks wonderful. We had baklava at Christmas time and it was delicious! I bet yours was too.
Oh I LOVE baklava! Can't wait to try making it with my son!
Boy that looks good! I always thought Baklava is really hard to make. Yours turned out so beautifully!
Yum, yum and yum again!!!
You are invited to join my new weekly link-up "Say it Two Ways Thursdays"! I would love for you to link up activities like this that teach your child about other languages and cultures. Link up at toddlefast.blogspot.com/2013/01/link-up-say-it-two-ways-thursdays.
This looks really good! I am not a big fan of baklava personally, since I find it too sweet, but daughter loves it.
Just featured you on this month's Culture Swapper!
http://alldonemonkey.com/2013/03/01/march-culture-swapper-is-live/
These look so good, you could sell them (I'd buy it!)