Atayef With Cheese (Arabic Version of Pancake Filled With Cheese)

The Holy Month of Ramadan, which started about twelve days ago, is the month of fasting for the Muslim. But, after fasting for more then 14 hours, the dinner in Ramadan consist in the most variety of rich foods and desserts. Atayef is a kind of sweet very popular in Ramadan, the dough could be filled either of cheese or with Ashta (kind of Arabic cream). This sweet requires quite some time to prepare but it is worth it.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups of flour
• 2 teaspoons yeast
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 cup orange blossom water
• 1 1/2 cup water
• 500 grams Akawi cheese (or Mozzarella). Akawi cheese is a kind of salted cheese like feta
• sugar syrup
• about 2 cups of frying oil

Preparation:

• Start by cutting the cheese into small pieces and soak in water to remove the salted taste, change the water every half an hour for about 3 times, or until you find the cheese is sweet enough,(if you are using mozzarella cheese you can skip this step)
• Prepare the dough: dissolve the yeast in a cup of warm water and leave for few minutes

• Mix the flour with the baking powder, add the yeast with water, the orange blossom water and the water until you have the consistency of a pancake dough. Let it set for about one hour, until it double volume
• Heat a large non stick saucepan, and place about half cup of the dough and cook from one side only, you will see on the uncooked side some bubbles formed, that means that the dough is perfect

• Place the cooked Atayef on a plate until they cool down
• When the cheese is no longer salty, discard the water, place on a strainer and rub it with you fingers
• Pinch each piece of Atayef and fill it with a teaspoon of cheese and close it tightly

• Heat the oil and fry the Atayef about 4 to 5 minutes, place them on a kitchen towel to remove the excess oil, then dip them in sugar syrup

For the sugar syrup:

• In a casserole boil 4 cups of sugar with 2 cups of water, then add the juice of half lemon, allow to cool a little then add about 1/4 cup of orange blossom water.

ET VOILA..C’EST TOUT..BON APPETIT 🙂