Saturday, February 5, 2011

Individual Spinach Pies (Fatayah) Bet ya can't eat just one!


If you love spinach, these little delectables will become one of your favorite foods as a snack or a main course!
Use the same dough that is in the meat pie recipe.

Filling:
6 cups fresh baby spinach (this will be about three cup after washing)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup lemon juice
olive oil
salt
Lebanese pepper (or a nice Jamaican allspice)

Dough:
1 package dry yeast
1 cup warm water
1 tsp. sugar
2 tbs. olive oil
3 cups of flour

Combine yeast, water, and sugar. Let this sit for about 10 minutes. Add flour slowly, about a half cup at a time, until you have a nice dough consistency. Depending on the weather, believe it or not, you may have to add a teaspoon of water to get the consistency right.  Separate into balls a little larger than golf balls. OK, there's the dough.

OR:
1 bag of pizza dough, rolled out and cut into 4" circles


Put the spinach in a bowl and cover well with water and salt. Let this sit for about 1/2 hour. The leaves will wilt..they are supposed to.


Next, take the spinach leaves after they have soaked, and squeeze them out in a colander. Then squeeze them out again. And then again. OK you can stop squeezing now. The point is, you want all the excess moisture out.
Mix the rest of the ingredients together then add to the spinach and mix well.

On 4 inch circles of dough, spoon about 2 tablespoons of spinach mixture into the middle. Fold up the edges and pinch them together to make a triangle. It starts like this:

Then fold in the third side.

Place these on a non stick baking sheet and bake for 25 minutes at 350 degrees. Spray with olive oil spray. If you don't hide these, you won't have a chance to have seconds. Trust me.

9 comments:

  1. I'm using this recipe as a spinach side dish, glad I found it. I grew up with the recipes you present and it makes me smile to see them all

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  2. Hey, I just found this little blog, thank you so much for sharing these! Trying to recreate all those great feelings from my childhood too, from all the family gatherings. You describe these dishes exactly as I remember them.

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  3. You are very welcome! And thank you!

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  4. love your recipes! do need to let the dough rise? can you use it right after you knead it?

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    Replies
    1. You can let the dough rise for about 2 hours. Good catch. I left that out.

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  5. How much Lebanese pepper and oil are you supposed to add to the spinach mixture?

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  6. About a teaspoon. Sorry I took a year to respond. I must have been very busy! lol

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  7. best Lebanese food in Abu Dhabi (أفضل الأطعمة اللبنانية في أبو ظبي).

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