baklava

Armenian food: baklava and lahmajoon

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It’s another viewer redemption!

This time, one of our long-time viewers chose Armenian food.

Lahmajoon (Armenian pizza)

Ordinarily, I’d do a ton of research trying to learn about the country’s cuisine, and decide which recipe I wanted to make.

However, this particular viewer is also a fellow cooking streamer – and his specialty is pizza. So when he mentioned lahmajoon and referred to it as “Armenian pizza”… it was a no-brainer.

Lahmajoon (Armenian pizza)

I used a combination of two recipes for the lahmajoon. (I’ve seen a number of different spellings of this, but as far as I can tell, the Armenian version is usually spelled something like lahmajoon.). For the dough, we used the recipe from here, and for the lamb topping we used this recipe.

An artsy tomato

The lahmajoon was delicious, and so easy to make! Aside from the time needed to let the dough rise, it was fairly quick and easy to prep. I’ve really developed a taste for lamb in the last year, but even if you’re not much of a lamb person I think you’d enjoy this dish. The crust ends up super cruncy, and the topping is meaty, savory, not particularly gamey, and overall delicious.

Lahmajoon (Armenian pizza)

And then we made balkava!

Balkava

Baklava is one of those things I’ve always wanted to make, but could never really justify. BUT there is an Armenian version of baklava, so that instantly went on my menu for today.

Balkava

Armenian baklava is a little different from the baklava I’ve tried in the past. We used this recipe, which is not as cloyingly honey-sweet as other baklava is, and much more spiced, with the cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves.

I also used pecans instead of the walnuts (because I totally thought I had walnuts on hand… and I was wrong), which overall led itself to a Christmas-y sort of flavor, with all the wintery spices. I’m sure it would have been just as tasty with the walnuts, but overall I was very, very happy with how it turned out.

Balkava

People are not kidding when they say it’s a pain in the ass to make baklava. (And SO much butter… I think I had almost a pound of butter in the batch.). Next time I’d try making it in a larger dish – I used a 9×13 casserole dish this time, which meant I had to fold each sheet of filo in half (so much more work) and ended up with leftover filo. But it was 100% worth it. 10/10, would make both of today’s dishes again!

Balkava

Today’s Question of the Day: What is your funniest cooking fail?

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3 thoughts on “Armenian food: baklava and lahmajoon”

  1. A_Boleyn -

    Beautiful baklava … makes me want to reach into the monitor and grab a few.

    The lahmajoon is tempting as well. I make pizza from scratch a lot but the ground lamb topping is a new one to me. I’ll have to save the recipe. Thank you.

  2. Allison -

    Thank you! I’m so happy with how the baklava turned out, it was so worth all the work. The lamb topping is really tasty, and I’m sure it would go great on normal pizza crusts as well.

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