Baklava is a sweet pastry of layered filo dough filled with chopped nuts and soaked in sugar or honey syrup. It's popular across Türkiye, the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Caucasus, with each country having its own variation – and many claiming it as part of their own culinary heritage.
The “nationalisation” of baklava began in 2013, when the European Commission registered Gaziantep baklava as a protected geographical indication, protecting the label “Antep Baklavası” from imitators. Gaziantep is Türkiye's baklava capital.
But while Turkish historiography insists that baklava in its modern form was developed in Ottoman Istanbul, Greek historians argue that the iconic pastry was invented in the Byzantine Empire, the medieval predecessor of modern Greece.
In January 2025, Greek members of the European Parliament submitted a request to the Parliament “asserting the Greek origins of baklava”, citing concerns over Azerbaijan and Turkiye’s claims to the pastry.
Gastronationalism
Scholars call this national(ist) obsession with food origins gastronationalism, and Erdoğan’s Türkiye seems to be particularly invested in it.
Last week, as high‑profile guests from across the NATO member states arrived in Ankara for the alliance’s summit, baklava was often served as dessert, while other contested regional favourites were presented as part of the country’s unique culinary heritage.
Türkiye’s top chefs spent eight months crafting this “authentic” Turkish menu, in coordination with president Erdoğan's Directorate of Communication, whose main aim is to “empower the Türkiye brand.”
The fact that Azerbaijan and Türkiye jointly applied to get baklava recognised as part of both countries' cultural heritage is also a manifestation of gastronationalism. The two neighbours are model allies, and their bilateral relations follow the “one nation, two states” formula. They support each other in all areas of cooperation: military, diplomacy, economy, education, and now also cuisine.
Contested post-Ottoman space
As many of the dishes in the post-Ottoman space are contested, national(ist) governments of the region have realised they need an official UN ‘stamp’ to formalise food ownership.
In 2014, for instance, UNESCO registered “the preparation, meaning, and appearance” of lavash, a regional flatbread, as an “expression of culture in Armenia.” Azerbaijan protested the organisation's decision, and so in 2016 UNESCO recognised the making and sharing of the flatbread as an intangible cultural heritage of several countries of the region, including Azerbaijan and Türkiye.
In 2017, the sharing and making of dolma, an iconic regional dish that is claimed by dozens of countries from the Balkans to Central Asia, was recognised as a marker of Azerbaijani cultural identity․ Armenians were not happy, calling the Azerbaijani claim “ungrounded and illiterate.”
The Azerbaijani–Turkish baklava bid comes a few months after a restaurant in Thessaloniki, Greece, requested UNESCO to recognise patsa, a regional soup, as authentically Greek, tracing its roots back to the time of Homer. Turkish media have disputed Greece’s bid, claiming that the soup, known as işkembe in Türkiye, is originally Turkish, citing the 17th‑century traveller Evliya Çelebi’s account of the dish as evidence.
Symbolic
Discussions on UNESCO status come up every year, and not just from the post-Ottoman space. Many states treat UNESCO status like a trademark.
“It’s purely symbolic,” Chiara Bortolotto, heritage anthropologist at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, told The European Correspondent in December 2025, before UNESCO's previous annual session. “Heritage is a political tool, that's not a secret. States use it for visibility, prestige, and identity-building.” In other words, a low-cost machine for nationalism and soft power.
But what does a designation actually mean on the ground? In most cases, very little. UNESCO offers no money, no guaranteed support, and hardly any follow-up. What it does provide is visibility, and visibility can change things.
Sometimes for the better. Swiss yodel advocates hope that yodelling's listing last year will get the form of singing into school curricula. After Naples' pizzaiuolo was inscribed, demand for authentic pizza-making courses jumped worldwide.
Whether baklava gains greater visibility as a UNESCO‑recognised Azerbaijani–Turkish pastry will only be determined after the organisation’s upcoming session in December.