Spanakopita

Thank you to my greek cooking instructors Jim and Barbara Pappas for the original recipe, you should really go check out one of their classes if you live in Winnipeg.

The images included here are from the tiropitakia recipe, but as things are the same with a different filling I figured I would leave the folding shots in until I make the spanos again.

Note: Please excuse the deplorable kitchen, this is what I've been stuck in for 8 months and I'm finally leaving in two weeks.

Yield

Yield depends on how you fold them, one recipe produces 3-4 dozen party sized ones for me usually.

Ingredients

• 2 Packages of frozen spinach (drained)
• 3/4 Green Onions (finely chopped)
• 1/2 Cups of good Feta Cheese (crumbled)
• 4 Eggs (seperated)
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• Fresh Dill (chopped) to taste

• Phyllo pastry (try to get a box that looks fairly new, this box was incredibly dry and a pain in the ass to work with. Let it thaw in the fridge a few hours before trying to work with it.)
• Some melted butter and a pastry brush.

Method

• Note that the folding method is the same for all these greek triangles and only the filling differs. I'll be putting up recipes for the other 4 fillings I've have soon.

Filling

• Drain the spinach completely, then add egg yolks, dill, onion, salt and pepper and cheese and mix well.

• Beat the egg whites in a seperate bowl, then combine, folding into the main mixture.

Folding

NOTE: These images are from the Tiropitakia recipe, your filling should look much different but the principle is the same

• Preheat oven to 325F

• Give yourself lots of room to work with on a pastry sheet or the like. I just sold my kitchen table yesterday so I'm stuck on the counter for these, god I hate this kitchen.

• While working with phyllo, take one sheet to work with long side facing you and gently lay a slightly moistened cloth over the rest of the pastry to keep it from drying out.

• Using a knife slice your phyllo sheet into equal sections. For appetizer/snack sized tiros 6 equal sections work best. If you want to make meal sized ones, I suggest placing down a double or triple layer of phyllo depending on thickness and just halving the sheets.(that much filling will leak otherwise)

• Taking your strip of phyllo, brush a little bit of melted butter over the edges then place a dollop of filling (not too much) and begin the folding process.

• Taking one bottom corner, fold it to create a triangle like so.

• Then fold upwards to square off the end again, before taking the other bottom corner and folding it to create a triangle again.

• Keep folding until you've used the whole strip then put aside.

• Repeat until filling or phyllo runs out.

• Gently brush all finished triangles with a bit of butter.

• Bake at 325 for 20 minutes until golden brown. (watch carefully as they burn and dry out easily)

Serving

These can be served straight from the oven or made the night before and reheated later.

Serve as a party snack or as an appetizer before a feast of Moussaka or Souvlaki and Greek Lemon Potatoes

My favorite way to serve is a mix of these and tiropitakia giving a choice of flavours as not everyone likes spinach but only terrible heathens will dislike both.