Baklava Cookie Bar

Happy Friday! This week has felt especially long. My husband has been traveling and the house feels very empty without him. He comes home this weekend, so I wanted to make him his favorite dessert. He's obsessed with baklava, but I didn't have any phyllo dough in the freezer, so I decided make cookie bars instead. It turned out absolutely delicious and I can't wait for him to come home and give it a try. 

Pre-baked cookie crust

Cookie crust out of the oven

Nut topping before it was baked

Syrup topping

INGREDIENTS

CRUST

• 1 1/2 sticks butter, room temperature (12 tbsp)
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ground cardamom 

TOPPING

• 2/3 cup pecans, chopped
• 2/3 cup walnuts, chopped
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp cardamom
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 3 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

SYRUP

• 1/4 cup water
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tbsp rose water
• 1 tbsp honey

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line an 8 inch square baking sheet with parchment paper 
2. In a stand mixer, beat together butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar on medium speed with the paddle attachment for 5 minutes. Add in the vanilla and beat for another minute.
3. In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and ground cardamom. Add in the dry ingredients to your butter mixture and beat on low speed until incorporated.
4. Press dough evenly onto prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes, until golden brown. 
5. While the crust is in the oven, make the nut topping by combining pecans, walnuts, brown sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, and melted butter in a bowl. 
6. When the crust is ready, spoon the topping over warm crust and return back to the oven for another 10 minutes.
7. While the bars are in the oven, combine water, sugar, rose water, and honey in a small saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and let simmer for about 3 minutes. Remove from heat.
8. Once the bars are out of the oven, let sit for 5 minutes before spooning the warm syrup over the bars. Let the bars cool completely in the pan before removing and cutting into triangles.