Zspider wrote:
> Julia Altshuler wrote:
>
> I do make a nice spanakopita and did then. I'm not sure I do anything
> spectacular with it, but it always seems to be appreciated when I bring
> it to potlucks. So there's my specialty: spanakopita.
>
> ***************
> Hmmm... How about your recipe? I've been having fun trying some
> Greek recipes and would like yours for spanakopita.
I'm assuming you know how to work with phyllo dough. I won't type out
those instructions. The following isn't necessarily exact. The recipe
is very forgiving. You can get away with using more or fewer eggs or
varying the cheeses and vegetables. Anyway, here's roughly the way I do it.
In a frying pan, heat some olive oil. Add a chopped onion and brown.
You can add chopped garlic at this point too.
Now add 2# of spinach. You can start with fresh leaves that have been
cleaned and wilted in a steamer, then had the moisture squeezed out.
You can take the moisture out by rubbing the leaves with salt. After
all these years, I now use frozen, thaw, and squeeze out the excess
liquid. This is one place where frozen is a time saver and really
tastes just as good as fresh.
Stir spinach and onions together. I just leave everything in the frying
pan and use that for my mixing bowl. If the spinach was hot when you
added it, you need to make sure everything is cool before adding the
eggs so they don't fry. You can do that by adding the cheese first.
Add 2 cups of crumbled feta cheese. As much as I like salt, I soak the
feta in fresh water to de-salt it first. You don't have to do this.
Also add 2 cups of ricotta cheese or any similar fresh curd cheese.
I've substituted cream cheese in a pinch, even a little sour cream. If
the feta is too strong a flavor, you can use more ricotta and less feta.
You could even use grated cheddar or parmesan though that's flying in
the face of traditional. If you're using grated hard cheeses, use less
than the full 4 cups of soft cheeses.
Add 5 eggs (or 4 or 7; really anything goes). Stir the whole mess
together making sure the eggs coat everything. This is now your
spanakopita filling. If you think all Greek food needs oregano, add it
now too, but I've never been able to taste it. Pepper might be good too.
Now layer your phyllo and butter in a baking dish, put the filling in
the middle and layer more phyllo on top. Or you could fold it up into
triangles.
--Lia
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