During the Easter holiday almost every household in the Middle East will start baking. You will smell the aromas of the tchoregs or braided breads, the sweet and the savory cookies and the infinite kinds of Maamools. They could be stuffed with pistachios, walnuts, cashews, or dates. Hours upon hours the neighborhoods would be full of ladies baking for days on end. The next morning during the ritual coffee breaks taken visiting each other, there would be comparisons and critiques of the different ways of making these cookies . making each maamool is very time consuming. In the sake of saving time , I decided this yer to change the shape and make these delicacies in the shape of a cake where it would be easy to make , bake and serve.

Recipe:

4 cups of semolina

1 cup of Farina( cream of wheat)

1 cup of butter melted

1 cup of ghee melted

1/2 teaspoon of instant yeast

1/2 teaspoon ground fenugreek(mahlab)

1/2 cup rose water and 1/2 cup orange blossom water mixed

Filling:

2 cups of gourd pistachios

1 cup of sugar

1 Teaspoon of cinnamon

1 tablespoon Rose water

1 Tablespoon Orange blossom water

Decorate:

1 cup of confectioner’s sugar

Pistachio halves ground coarsely

Mix all the ingredients of the main recipe , except for the rose water and the orange blossom water in a medium bowl and let it rest overnight.

In the morning, dip your fingers in the orange blossom/rosewater mixture and knead the dough and work the dough until soft and manageable.It should resemble the texture of a pizza dough, and let it rest ,covered for a couple of hours.

In a separate bowl, mix the ground nuts with the sugar and the cinnamon and the flavored waters. set aside.

Preheat the oven to 350F

Butter 2 cheesecake pans ( springform) . Divide the dough in 4 pieces and lay one layer of dough, cover with the pistachios and lay another layer of dough on top.Repeat for the second pan. Bake for 30minutes in a hot oven or until somewhat pink on top.

Let it cool.

Unmold and sprinkle a thick layer of confectioner’s sugar , decorate with ground pistachios and Serve.