diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/kaldi/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/kaldi/package.py
index c98df6aa19..0b9cdd3c12 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/kaldi/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/kaldi/package.py
@@ -68,7 +68,7 @@ def install(self, spec, prefix):
                 configure_args.append('--threaded-atlas')
         elif '^intel-parallel-studio' in spec or '^intel-mkl' in spec:
             configure_args.append('--mathlib=MKL')
-            configure_args.append('--mkl-root=' + spec['blas'].prefix)
+            configure_args.append('--mkl-root=' + spec['blas'].prefix.mkl)
             if '+openmp' in spec['blas'].variants:
                 configure_args.append('--mkl-threading=iomp')