Chapter Text
Mama was late. Not very late, but Yaffa was a little bit anxious. Today was Gökçe’s first birthday, and everyone had helped Caria make a special dinner.
“She’ll be here soon, right D’vora?”
“Yup.” D’vora was ten now, old enough that fifteen minutes late didn’t worry her at all. Not even a little.
Suddenly Gökçe looked up. “I smell Mama! She’s coming!” Gökçe paused, then said, “She’s not alone—what is that smell?”
Rafael looked at Caria and Burak. All he could smell was the baklava.
Then Sara entered the room. She was alone—except two half-grown black kittens were peeking out of her blue ferace. Now Rafael could smell something over the pomegranate syrup. Not a good something.
“I am so sorry to be late,” said Sara, “but as you can see, I found a surprise at the palace!”
“A birthday surprise!” said Gökçe. “Those are kittens, but they smell like the midden. Yum.”
Sara smiled. “Gökçe, I know you like the smell of garbage. Would you please help me put the kittens in the garden with a blanket and some chicken? Mince it with your talons as finely as you can.”
In ten minutes, the kittens were happily eating and Sara was happily washing her hands, her ferace and kaftan set aside for laundry day. Her zıbın, a short, fitted jacket, was striped dark and light blue.
**
Yaakov gasped as Sara entered the dining room. “Mama, did you wear that zıbın on purpose? You look like Gökçe!”
“I did,” Sara smiled. “Happy birthday, my dear.”
“That’s the third time today you’ve wished Gökçe a happy birthday,” D’vora said, just a bit crossly. She was too old for anything as babyish as jealousy. Rafael raised an eyebrow at her as a reminder.
D’vora blushed and added hastily, “I’m really happy it’s your first birthday and you can already talk and play games. Human babies take too long to grow up!”
“Gökçe has been old enough to play since forever,” Yaffa chimed in. “Oh, and we made the dough for the baklava, Mama. I made mine really thin!”
“Caria says my pieces are the thinnest, and I got to grind the pistachios,” said Yaakov.
Caria winked at Sara.
“Thank you all for making dinner,” Sara said. “Let’s eat! I can’t wait to try everything.”
**
When it was time for dessert, Caria brought in the platter of baklava. The pieces were cut into lozenges and the golden-brown color was accentuated by the bright green of the ground pistachios. There were enough pieces for everyone to have two—and three for the birthday dragon.
Rafael had one more surprise that evening. A letter had arrived from England bearing birthday greetings from Temeraire, Admiral Laurence, and Mr. Tharkay.
“My dearest Gökçe,” Temeraire had dictated, “Please accept my best wishes on the Occasion of your first Birthday. I hope that this Letter finds you happy.”
And it did.
Baklava: A Brief History
Baklava is a stack of phyllo pastry (a very thin dough variously spelled phyllo, filo, and fillo) that’s stuffed with a variety of chopped nuts and then sweetened with honey or syrup.
One website cautioned, “It doesn’t matter which way you spell it, but please: Pronounce it “fee-low.” “Phyllo” means leaf in Greek.
Like many Mediterranean dishes, baklava engenders fierce rivalries. The Greeks and Turks, in particular, disagree about whose ancestors invented it. Baklava was first mentioned in Ottoman writings in 1473 in notes from the Topkapi Palace kitchen. Baklava was first mentioned in English in 1650. Until the 19th century, it was considered a dessert for wealthy people, who derived prestige from serving baklava made with the thinnest possible dough sheets.
During the 17-19th centuries, the sultan of the Ottoman Empire presented trays of baklava to his personal troops, the Janissaries, every 15th of the month of Ramadan in a ceremonial procession called the Baklava Parade. This ended rather abruptly when Sultan Mahmud II forcibly eliminated the Janissaries in 1826 by tricking them into attacking his new army and executing or exiling the survivors.
At the beginning of the 2020 Netflix movie The Old Guard, also known as one of the only bright spots in 2020, Nicky loses a bet that Andy won’t be able to identify the provenance of the baklava that he bought her. Andy munches the baklava, saying, “hazelnut... Black Sea... rosewater... pomegranate... eastern Turkey!”
Here’s the scene: Nicky Loses a Bet
When the experts get down to business, a regular-sized ball of dough is stretched thinner and thinner on the backs of the bakers’ hands into a thin sheet of dough as long and wide as a dining room tablecloth. The sheets of dough are like tissue paper—you can read through them.
I also watched a video in which a non-professional baker made phyllo. His secret was to keep the balls of dough small and use a rolling pin with a corn starch and flour mixture.
Baklava is normally prepared in large pans. Layers of phyllo dough, separated with melted butter and vegetable oil, are laid in the pan. A layer of chopped nuts—typically walnuts or pistachios, but hazelnuts are also sometimes used—is placed on top, then more layers of phyllo. Most recipes have multiple layers of phyllo and nuts.
Before baking, the dough is cut into regular pieces, often parallelograms (lozenge-shaped), triangles, diamonds or rectangles. After baking, a syrup, which may include honey, rosewater, or orange flower water, is poured over the baklava and allowed to soak in.
Baklava is usually served at room temperature and is often garnished with ground nuts. When you use pistachios, it looks like vivid green confetti on top.
Istanbul (Not Constantinople)
Constantinople didn't become known as Istanbul in the West until the early 20th century. İstanbul was used in Turkish alongside Kostantiniyye during the period of Ottoman rule, while Western languages mostly continued to refer to the city as Constantinople. In 1928, the Turkish alphabet was changed from Arabic script to Latin script. After that, as part of the Turkification movement, Turkey started to urge other countries to use Turkish names for Turkish cities.
Naomi Novik's characters refer to the city as Istanbul in the Temeraire series, which is only anachronistic from a Western point of view.