Cheese cigars, easy as, and with one hand only!

With one hand only because with the other I was taking pictures :-)!!!.

Cheese cigars are rolls of filo pastry filled with cheese and then fried or baked (I bake them). I just put all my filo pastry sheets on a tray and fold them one by one until I used them all up. Proceed like for a spring roll, rolling the cheese stick up a few times (picture 2 and 3), and then folding in the sides in (picture 4) before continuing to roll. This way you will seal the cheese in. You can repeat it with a second sheet of pastry if you think that the cheese will melt out into the tray (or if you like to have more pastry!).

Once more: this time I put a bit of chopped parsley with the cheese so that it is easier to see. In pictures 5 and 6 you can see how the sides are rolled in.

Last time now, pizza cigars, I put a strip of tomato paste, then cheese, then oregano, roll, fold the sides in, and roll again until the end.  Brush with water and bake at 180 C° until golden in colour.

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

doconstructed spanakopita: ovvero, budino caldo di spinaci con salsa di formaggio feta al profumo di origano e cracker di pasta filo al burro salato

I though a lot about this, I am not the type to 'deconstruct' dishes, but I wanted to try. And I wanted a spinach pudding, but spinach puddings started to pop up right and left on the MTChallenge, and I wasn't sure if I should add another one... but in the end I decided to go for it, and this is the result!

The puddings are really soft but perfectly set and stable, so you will make an impression with your guests!

Ingredients

For the savory spinach mini puddings:

500 g chopped frozen spinach

Water

100 ml milk

2 tbsp grated parmesan cheese

3 eggs

Salt to taste

Salted butter to grease the ramekins

For the Feta Sauce:

100 g feta

A sprig of oregano (or a pinch of dried oregano)

A little milk and hot water

For the Filo Crackers:

5 sheets of film pastry

Salted butter, melted, to brush

Boil the spinach with water, then drain but do not squeeze. Put the spinach in a bowl and blend with an immersion blender. Add the milk and blend again. Add the parmesan and eggs and blend again. Taste for salt then add salt. Grease 8 ramekins with butter and fill with the spinach mixture, then cover with baking paper and secure with a rubber band. Place in a roasting pan filled with water (only half-way through the ramekins) and bake at 160° C for about one hour. 

To make the sauce just brake the feta with a fork and thin down with a little milk and a little hot water until you get a creamy consistency. Do not use a blender but just a fork. Add the oregano and set aside.

To make the filo crackers, place 3 sheets of filo on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Brush with melted salted butter, then add 2 more sheets of filo and brush again. Using a pizza cutter or a knife make some incisions over the pastry to cut it into 8 rectangles, and then each rectangle into 2 triangles. Make sure that the incisions are all the way through the pastry (i.e. the pastry is cut into 16 triangles). Bake with the spinach pudding (on a different rack, of course!) until the top of the filo is golden and crispy.

Remove the puddings from the oven and reverse over the serving plates (they should come out easily, but otherwise just pass the borders with a knife). Add two filo triangles and a spoonful of feta sauce to each plate. Serve immediately as an antipasto. These puddings are soft, moist and creamy and can be eaten with a spoon, or a dessert fork, and are suited to open a formal dinner. My family really liked them, but I guess that they like Spanakopita too!

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©

With this recipe I take part in the MTCHALLENGE di Maggio 2012

from Menù Turistico

L'EMMETICHALLENGE DI MAGGIO 2012

How to make a low fat Spanakopita (with onion weeds, again!)

The first time I used filo, long time ago now, I learned to spread melted butter every two sheets of pastry. It seemed a lot but I didn't have the courage to skip this step. Then I started to put less and less (only for baklava I keep using lots of butter, but then you only get a tiny piece so that is ok, I guess :-), or to use olive oil, which felt more 'Mediterranean' than butter. But filo pastry is very low fat in itself and I wondered if I really needed to use fat... this version has no butter or oil, and yet it tastes great! 

Generally I use feta, spinach, garlic and cumin, or oregano. But while the onion weed abounds I thought "why not?", and made it with it.

I picked, washed and chopped some onion weed, using the bulbs, stems, leaves and flowers. I mixed with 600 g of frozen chopped spinach (defrosted at room temperature) and a big block of goat feta.

I used about 180 g of filo for this pie, half in the bottom, covered with the filling leaving a bit of a border, then I folded the borders in, and topped everything with the remaining filo sheets, tucking the borders under (like when you make a bed). I didn't spread any butter or oil between the filo sheets, instead I brushed the top and sides with water, so they didn't burn in the oven. This seems to be a common problem with filo pies, often the top gets really brown before the pie is cooked! I baked everything at 180° (fan) for about 30 minutes (didn't really check the exact time, sorry, but you can see it when is ready, the filo has colour underneath as well as at the top) and it was perfect!

With this recipe I take part in the event Healthy Cooking Challenge - Healthy Bakes

organized by Smita, and this month hosted by Priya.  Thank you ladies for this lovely blogging event!

Also, while I am here, I would like to share another review for Party Food for Girls which I really liked. Off to get ready for the big Italian Festival in Auckland (will post more about it later).

Ciao

A.

Photos and Recipes by Alessandra Zecchini ©