Künefe (Antakya's Molten Cheese Dessert with Kataifi and Syrup) 🧀

Name: Künefe (Antakya's Molten Cheese Dessert with Kataifi and Syrup)
Prep time: 18 min
Cook time: 27 min
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 2-4 servings
Cuisine: Cocina turca
Ingredients: 300 g kataifi (shredded wheat pastry), separated and fluffed; 150 g unsalted stretching cheese (plain halloumi rinsed, fresh mozzarella pressed dry, or Akkas/Abu al-Leben); 100 g butter, melted; Syrup: 200 g sugar + 150 ml water + 1 tbsp lemon juice; boiled 7 minutes; cooled; 1 tsp orange blossom water; To finish: 50 g crushed green pistachios; extra butter for the pan

In Antakya, künefe is not a dessert but a civic religion: shredded kataifi pastry pressed around a layer of unsalted, stretchy goat cheese, baked in copper trays over open flame until the underside crackles, then doused with clear orange-blossom syrup and buried under crushed pistachios. It arrives sizzling, the cheese pulling in ropes when you break the crust — and everyone at the table waits exactly too long because of it.

Hatay Cocina turca ⏱ 45 min Fácil

Método

1

Toss fluffed kataifi with the melted butter until every strand is coated. Press half into two buttered small trays or one wide pan, compact and level.
2

Grate or tear the cheese and spread in an even blanket over the base, leaving a 1 cm margin. Cover with remaining buttered kataifi and press firm.
3

Bake at 200 °C for 25–30 minutes until deep gold and crackling; for the stove version, flip in the pan like a giant pancake so both sides blister.
4

Drench with cool syrup straight from the oven — hot pastry + cold syrup is the crackle contract. Do not skimp: künefe drinks it.
5

Scatter pistachios and serve within minutes, while the cheese still strings. In Antakya the spoon test is mandatory: pull, watch the rope, nod.

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Künefe (Antakya's Molten Cheese Dessert with Kataifi and Syrup) 🧀

Método

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