Buttery Baklava Bites: Baking With Bubby Jeanette & Granddaughters Daniela and Jeanette Hamui

In our YouTube series, Baking With Bubby, we feature our Taglit-Birthright Israel alumni with their Bubbys, exploring how their families pass on recipes, traditions, and laughter in the kitchen. You can enjoy more family stories, episodes of Baking With Bubby, and recipes on our Facebook Community, Around the Table. 

In this episode, we visited Mexico City, where Bubby Jeanette Helfon Ezban and her granddaughters Daniela Hamui (Taglit-Birthright Israel alum from the summer of 2011), and Jeanette Hamui (Taglit-Birthright Israel alum from the summer of 2019) were making buttery baklava bites together. Baklava is a Middle-Eastern dessert that is sweet, soft, and flakey. Follow along to read more about this amazing family and delicious recipe!

Connecting With Culture

“We don’t cook a lot alone,” Daniela explains. “When we cook, we cook with her.” She says, gesturing to Bubby Jeanette. 

Jeanette Hamui, Bubby Jeannete’s granddaughter and namesake, agrees and explains, “We were going to spend time in Canada, and she said she had to teach us how to cook before we left.” 

In this episode, Daniela and Jeanette Hamui prepare to make baklava for the very first time.

“I started cooking by making cakes, jellies, desserts, pastries, and even Arabic pastries because you can make them then freeze them, and they’re easy to bring out,” she explains. “It is an Arabic tradition. It comes from the ancestors, from my uncles, from my grandmothers, so it’s something we already have.” 

“My great-grandmother taught, my grandma. And she [Bubby Jeanette] is teaching us now,” Jeanette Hamui explains. She and Daniela explain that food is important—especially in Jewish culture. ”It’s the main thing that brings us together,” Daniela explains. 

A Bubby’s Love

“We have a very close relationship; having someone that listens to you and hears you, and gives you advice…we love her a lot,” laughs Jeanette about her and her sister’s relationship with their Bubby Jeanette. 

Bubby smiles back, “I feel very proud. I ask God that with whatever they do, that they can fulfill themselves.”

Shabbat at Bubby Jeanette’s is one of Daniela and Jeanette’s favorite things. “Family time is a time to recharge and rejuvenate with the ones you love most,” Daniela says. Plus, Shabbat is an all-day event at Bubby Jeanette’s, starting with a big breakfast, an afternoon of cooking and lounging, followed by a giant Shabbat dinner and lots of laughter.

The Food

“I really value the traditions of where we come from, and this very tasty food is part of who we are,” says Bubby Jeanette.

While prepping in the kitchen, she shares stories of family past and present, where she learned her best recipes, and who made this baklava recipe before it was passed down to her.

Baklava is a treat Bubby Jeanette grew up eating at her mother’s or grandparents’ houses. Because of this, it inspired the making of today’s recipe at her house, with her own grandchildren now enjoying the sweet dessert.

“She’s always making meals to have us together—to have a place to see each other,” says Jeanette. 

Daniela echoes, “She’s always taking care of the family—looking to see how to help—and she’s always there for us.” 

This bubby truly inspires her granddaughters to build a solid, stable family of their own someday, built on food, love, and culture.

Get ready to follow along with Bubby Jeanette’s recipe down below!

The Recipe 

Bubby Jeanette’s Baklava:

1. Chop the pecans, and mix it with cinnamon and sugar.
2. Melt butter in a pan, and add blossom water and oil.
3. Lay out your phyllo dough and trim the excess dough.
4. Spread butter in the center of the dough, and add another phyllo sheet layer.
5. Repeat this process of layering and buttering the center.
6. Once done layering, add the pecan mixture to the top and spread.
7. Add one more phyllo dough layer over top of the pecan mixture.
8. Poke the dough all the way through the layers with a fork.
9. Cut the dough into diamond shapes.
10. Add water to the bottom of the baking pan, and place the pan in the oven for two hours.
11. Pour 1 cup of water, 1 cup of white sugar, a bit of blossom water, and a few squeezes of lemon into a pan. Saute the mixture until a caramelized honey is created.
12. Take the pan out of the oven and pour the honey mixture over the baklava.
13. Eat and enjoy!

Thanks for watching and making this sweet treat with us today!

You can enjoy more family stories, episodes of Baking With Bubby, and recipes on our Facebook Community, Around the Table. 

And follow the Hamui sisters and their buddy on social: 

• @danielahamui on Instagram and Daniela Hamui on Facebook
• @jean_hamui on Instagram and Jeanette Hamui on Facebook
• @jeanetteezban on Instagram and Jeanette Ezban on Facebook!