SPANAKOPITA

Servings: 20
Ingredients:

1 lb Filo dough                          3    Leeks, washed and
1/2 C  Olive oil                                -chopped
3 lb Spinach (5 packages,                1 lb Feta cheese
-if you use frozen                  1 C  Bread crumbs
-spinach)                           1 C  Milk
1/2 C  Butter, unsalted                    1 t  Salt
1 md Onion, chopped                           Pepper
5    Eggs

If you are using fresh spinach, wash it, dip it for a minute or two in
boiling water to blanch it, and then chop it. Drain the spinach and squeeze
most of the water out of it.

Wash thoroughly and chop the white part of the leeks. Peel and chop the
onion. Saute the chopped leeks and onion in the butter. Add the spinach,
salt and pepper. Mix everything together and simmer for 20 minutes.

While the spinach is cooking, grate the feta cheese (I use a food
processor). Alternatively, you can crumble it into small chunks.

Remove the spinach from heat and add the cheese, eggs (beaten), bread
crumbs and milk. Mix everything together and set aside. Grease a square
baking pan with a little olive oil. Take one sheet of dough and place it on
the bottom of the pan towards one of the corners, in such a way that the
dough sticks out a little from two of the sides of the pan. Brush the sheet
with olive oil. Repeat this step until you have used about two thirds of
the dough, alternating corners and always brushing each sheet of dough with
olive oil.

Pour the spinach mixture into the pan. Level it, and fold in the sides of
the assembled crust. Brush the dough with olive oil. Take one sheet of
dough and place it on top of the pie, this time without any bias towards
any of the corners. Brush the sheet with olive oil. Repeat this step until
you have used all the remaining dough, always brushing each sheet with
olive oil.

Gently tuck the edges of the top sheets of dough under the sides of the
pie. Brush the top with olive oil. Using a sharp knife cut the top of the
pie as if you were cutting it to serve it, but don’t go all the way to the
bottom. Sprinkle the pie with 1 T of water and bake it at 350 degrees F.
for 45 minutes. Let the pie cool and serve.

Unless you work quickly when assembling the dough layers, the unused pieces
of dough will dry out. Until you become nimble with this process, you can
cover the unused dough pieces with a damp dishcloth to prevent them from
drying out while you fumble with the construction of the pie.

NOTES:

* Greek spinach and feta cheese pie — This recipe is from a greek
cookbook, with my modifications and the addition of my mother’s secret
ingredient, leeks. ‘Filo’ or ‘fyllo’ is the greek word for ‘leaf.’

* I find that frozen spinach works wonderfully for this recipe. Also,it’s
cheaper and somewhat easier to prepare.

* The pie keeps well out of the refrigerator for a few days and can
(indeed, some claim must) be eaten at room temperature. Because of the way
the pie is constructed, pieces cut from the corners and sides of the pan
are particularly crunchy, and a lot of people consider them the best part
of the pie. This suits me just fine, because I like the middle pieces
which have more filling!

* The original recipe called for twice the amount of olive oil, but I find
that I don’t need that much.

: Difficulty: moderate.
: Time: 1 hour preparation, 45 minutes baking.
: Precision: approximate measurement OK.

: Kriton Kyrimis
: Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, USA
: kyrimis@princeton.edu allegra!princeton!kyrimis

: Copyright (C) 1986 USENET Community Trust

—–