Kunafa Rolls
Ingredients
Sugar Syrup
- 2 cups sugar
- 1 cup water
- ½ lemon, juiced
- 1 tsp orange blossom water
Ricotta Filling
- 400 g ricotta cheese
- 1 tbsp icing sugar
- 1 tsp orange zest
- pinch cardamom
Kunafa Rolls
- 500 g fresh kunafa
- 2 cups clarified butter, per instructions below, melted, and cooled slightly
- ground pistachios, for garnish
Instructions
- To make the sugar syrup, combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan, over medium- high heat; bring to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolved. Lower heat and leave to simmer for 10 minutes without stirring. Remove from heat, stir in orange blossom or vanilla essence; leave to cool.
- To make the filling, in a medium size bowl combine the ricotta cheese, orange zest, orange blossom and cardamon powder.
- To prepare the kunafa rolls, cut a layer of the kunafa into 5x12cm stands (make sure to cover the unused Kunafa with a damp kitchen tower to prevent it from drying out). Remove 1 cm of the stand and place it horizontally over the upper side of the larger strand to form a ‘T’. Place a couple teaspoons of the ricotta mixture over the thin strand, fold over the sides of the thin strand and tightly roll over to form a little cigar shaped roll. Place the kunafa roll seam down in a shallow baking pan greased with butter or ghee. Continue this same process with the rest of the kunafa.
- Allow the baking pan to rest at room temperature for an hour, until the pastry dries out before you bake.
- Pre-heat the oven at 200°C. Pour the clarified butter over the kunafa rolls and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until the kunafa develops a beautiful golden brown colour.
- Remove from the oven and with thongs transfer the Kunafa roll on a kitchen towel to drain the excess butter and place in another shallow pan. Pour the sugar syrup on top of the kunafa rolls and allow the syrup to soak in the rolls. Gently remove the rolls with a thong on the serving platter and garnish with ground pistachio before serving.