Tel Kadayif with Clotted Cream and Pistachios

For this luscious sweet, you need to buy the soft, white vermicelli-like pastry called kadayif by the Turks and knafe by the Lebanese from a Turkish or Lebanese store. In Egypt we called it konafa. I saw this pastry being prepared in a large frying pan in a restaurant in Istanbul, but it is easier to bake it in the oven. It is scrumptious both hot and cold. I even like it days after, when the syrup has soaked and softened the pastry—it keeps well in the refrigerator. You can buy unsalted, shelled pistachios in the same stores as kadayif. In Turkey they use the cream called kaymak (see page 218) but clotted cream is a very good alternative.