Spanakopita - A Greek Starter

Couple of months back after making an yummy Greek dessert - Baklava , I was wondering about how to use up the little of the remaining phyllo sheets. I thought of going again for the same Baklava - the rolled up version, then something stopped me warning me about the calories. So after browsing through the numerous bookmarked recipes on starters and appetizers, I settled on Spanakopita that aptly needed the exact amount of sheets that I had in hand.




I adapted the recipe from Here by omitting the egg and baking instead of frying.


Ingredients:
2 cups of frozen spinach
1 small onion minced
2 garlic cloves minced
1 tsp red chilli flakes.
2 tblsp of chopped parsley or cilantro
salt and pepper
Butter or olive oil for brussing the phyllo pastry

Method
Thaw and sqeeze all the water from the Spinach/
Take a tblsp of olive oil in a pan and saute onion and garlic.
Stir in the spinach, salt , pepper and redchili flakes. Saute for 2 mins.
Allow it to cool and mix in the Feta cheese.

Place 3 phyllo pastry sheets on a flat surface.
Brush them with melted butter or olive oil on one side.
Cut the Pastry sheets into thin long rectangular shapes.
Place a tblsp of the stuffing and fold it like a triangle.
Keep folding the triangle continuosly left and right till you reach the end of the strip.
It will resemble a samosa wrapped in layers of trace paper.
Seal the edges with melted butter.

Bake in the  180C preheated oven for 20 mins or the pastry is well browned.
You can also substitute the Feta cheese with Ricotta or crumbled Paneer.





Sending these to the AWED event started by DK held this month  at  TastyCurryLeaf and also to Divya's  Healing food Spinach event.

Sending this also to this week's Bake-off event over at Bangalore Baker

Kids Food : Spinach and Mushroom Quesadilla

As with every other PreSchooler My Kid just started hating rice. Till last month he was okay with whatever I gave him for lunch. But this month as soon as he turned 2 1/2 years,  his food priorities rapidly changed. The things which he used to love took a back seat and he has started becoming very picky. Fed up with my continuos effort to make him eat some form of rice  the past two days , I tried something different for lunch yesterday, with what was left in my refrigerator. The result was this yummy quesadilla, which he ate without any complaints ( Me too :)) , calling them 'Pizza'. Anything with cheese on it is Pizza for him...Yesterday's problem was solved..crossing my fingers for today ...

Coming to the recipe.

Sending these over to Divya at Dilse for Healing Food event where this months theme is Spinach. This event was originally started by Shri

Ingredients:
2 wheat tortillas
1 cup Spinach, washed and chopped
1 cup mushrooms chopped
1 garlic clove chopped
1/2 onion choped
salt and pepper taste.
Shredded cheese (any variety) as per need.

Method

For the filling:

To a tblsp of hot oil/butter  add chopped onion and garlic and saute till tranlucent
Add the spinach and mushrooms and saute till all the water from them evaporates.
Add salt and pepper , stir well and keep aside.

For Quesadillas:
Heat a griddle and warm the Tortilla.
Spread the filling in the center.Spread the chese on top of it.Fold the Tortilla to one side to make a semicircle(as we do for dosa.). Carefully turn them repeatedly, gently pressing with saptula, so that the cheese melts.
Remove when the cheese is completly melted.cut into wedges and serve with salsa or ketchup.

Tomato Olive Bruchetta with Mozerella

I regularly stock my pantry with the mini baguettes, that is ready after baking for just 12 mins.Very convenient to make garlic bread  as well as bruchetta's with various toppings.
To make it more rich, I top it with some left over mozerrella cheese (if any).Makes a delicous tea time snack.


Ingredients:

4 mini baguettes or a single loaf of French bread
1/2 cup tomato sauce / Pasta sauce
1/ 2 cup chopped tomatoes.
1/2 cup choped black olives
1/4 cup chopped jalapenos
2 tblsp chopped garlic
4 tblsp olive oil

few tblsp of shredded mozerella

2 tsp dried oregano  or dried basil as per taste.

Method.
Mix the chopped garlic with olive oil and leave it  to rest for about 10 mins
Bake the bread as per instructions
When the bread is cooled, cut into oblong slices
If its mini baquettes cut into half lengthwise.

Brush the bread with the garlic -olive oil mixture.
Spread a tsp of tomato sauce or pasta sauce, and sprinkle with oregano.

Spread the chopped olives , tomatoes, jalapenos as per taste.
Top with shredded mozorella and bake for 15 - 20 mins or until the cheese melts and brown spots appear.

Serve hot.

Some variations

Can avoid the cheese and just bake for 15 mins
Can also avoid the veggies and just bake it as garlic bread.
Can also use different combination of veggies as per taste
 (for ex ., onion + redpeppers+ jalapenos+ basil)

Sending these over to the WYF - Tea Time snack event over at Simple Indian Food an the Sunday Snacks - Cheese event at Mirch Masala