Künefe, the dessert which Antakya is proud of..Surprisingly it is also a picnic dessert.. Would you go for a picnic with a huge plate and a lot of stuff with you? But they do. Sure enough it is ok for a visitor like me! Read more !! After the grills, the master of künefe in the group, which can be a man as well, sits by the plate, mix all the stuff and cook it on the wood fire.. and dont forget turkish tea at picnic time:)actuakky we have a littel fire tube for this picnics and we said picnic tube its blue and small ....funny:)If you see a group of men, women and children walking down the street at a late hour carrying a big metal plate, this is to surprise a friend with künefe! Take the material and tepsi with you , when you finish, the tepsi will be empty in ten minutes!! Künefe, too is the name given to both the string-shaped dough and the final product: the dessert. It is even thinner than 'tel kadayıf'. What makes it special is cheese. Combination of cheese and sweet ingredients is not typical for the Turkish eating culture. Antakya was under the French rule for a short period in history. Can this be accountable? Dont know. I couldn't meet anybody who would clarify this point either. But künefe is the cheese kadayıf , with its own shops which sell only the half-baked dough threads and a very special cheese: 'künefe peyniri' .The cheese, too, becomes like strings when cooked, and the elastic 'fibers' of cheese in the hot syrup is what people like. Unlike kadayıf, it is cooked on fire but not baked in the oven. All the string shaped dough is cut into small pieces, kneaded with butter - or margarine-half is spread on the plate, pressed, then the cheese is added to cover all the surface, the other half is spread and the plate is placed on the heater. The heater is a small spot considering the plate. So the plate is rotated continously. When the bottom is baked, it should be reversed. But how? By covering it with another plate and just turn it upside down? But what about a small show? Just hold the hot plate, throw everything straight to the air, and while doing this make sure that it will fall back on the plate upside down! Voila!! then place it on the heater again...when baked, add the syrup..And if you think that throwing everything to the air and securing its turning back upside down is a manly show as Dagwood likes, think twice!!