Manakeesh and My Addiction to Baklava

Baklava is incredible. Layers of crunchy phyllo dough and pistachios, walnuts, or whatever other nut they felt like throwing in there make for one of my favorite desserts. My love for baklava was ignited two summers ago when I had baklava ice cream at a restaurant near my home in Seattle. It wasn’t actually a new type of ice cream, it was simply warm baklava, vanilla ice cream, and warm honey drizzled on atop. Still, it was incredible.

I hadn’t thought about baklava until I heard for the first time about Manakeesh. A housemate of mine had talked about the dinner there, but it wasn’t until I got a hold of a menu that I saw they had baklava. And not just one type of baklava, eight (if I remember correctly). Upon seeing how great their baklava selection was, I immediately traversed the four blocks to 44th and Walnut to get the baklava that I once again desperately desired.

And it was great. Buying six baklava from Manakeesh has since then been a necessary weekly expenditure. Please, get yourself to Manakeesh and buy baklava. It’s awesome. More importantly though, if enough people buy baklava on a given night, they will sell out and I will be unable to get my fix. It is then that my withdrawal will begin. Once it is over, I can return to a simpler time, when I didn’t have to spend $15.00 every Thursday on unhealthy baked goods. Here’s a picture of something else I once got from Manakeesh:

I have no idea what it is. I just know it was good. Manakeesh’s power bars are simply incredible.

-AJ Winkelman
PS, From next post on, I will write about food I make myself again. Stay tuned!