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Prep Time: 0 Minutes Cook Time: 60 Minutes |
Ready In: 60 Minutes Servings: 6 |
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Very yummy combination of spinach and feta cheese in a flaky pie crust. This is a favorite dinner of ours. Ingredients:
for the crust |
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour |
1/2 tsp salt |
1/2 cup cold butter (you can use shortening if you like, but remember, butter makes it better, or so i say) |
3-6 tablespoons ice water (the range is big, i know, but i find sometimes i need more and sometimes i need less. |
for the spinach and feta filling |
one box of frozen chopped leaf spinach (if you want to go to your friendly local organic farmer-emphasis on local- and use fresh spinach from them, by all means do so. if i had been making on sunday, i may have been using some from the farmer's market). |
1 medium yellow onion, diced. |
2 or 3 cloves of garlic, minced or pressed. |
2 tbsps butter (the amount of butter and olive oil can be cut down if you prefer) |
2 tbsps olive oil |
8 ounces feta cheese |
3 eggs |
2 egg yolks |
1 cup heavy cream or whole milk |
nutmeg to taste |
salt and pepper to taste |
Directions:
1. For the Crust:
2. -Mix the flour and the salt together in a medium bowl.
3. -Cut the butter into the flour and salt mixture until it resembles coarse peas (I did use pastry cutter for this today, as my hands seemed a bit hot, but by all means, get your hands into the dough!)
4. -Drizzle the ice water over the top of the dough (I start with 3 Tbsps and add more if needed) and gently mix the dough until it starts to come together. Form the shaggy dough into a disk and send it off to the refrigerator for about a half hour rest before rolling.
5. For the Spinach and Feta Filling and Quiche Assembly:
6. -Preheat the oven to 375 degrees f.
7. -Thaw and drain the spinach until it is as dry as you can get it. You may want to chop it up a bit more.
8. -Heat the olive oil and butter over medium heat until the butter is melted and bubbly.
9. -Sweat the onion and garlic in the olive oil mixture until the onions are translucent (enjoy the wonderful smell of cooking garlic and onion while doing this. Yum).
10. -Add the spinach to this mixture and continue cooking until the spinach is heated through. Remove from the heat.
11. -Crumble the feta into the spinach mixture and mix together. Set aside to cool.
12. -Pull your pie dough out of the refrigerator and roll out on a lightly floured board to the size you need for your pie tin (I used a 9 pie tin, somewhat shallow).
13. -Place the rolled out dough in the tin, place the spinach mixture in the dough.
14. -Beat together the eggs, yolks and cream. Add a little grate of nutmeg, fresh ground pepper and a pinch of salt (you won't need too much salt, as the feta is rather salty). Pour this mixture over the spinach/feta mix in the pie shell and mix together with your hands (or a spoon if you would rather not get your hands into this) carefully so as not to puncture the crust.
15. -Flute or fold the edges of your pie crust (I like to just fold over the excess crust for a rustic look). You can either bake this now, or chill until you need it.
16. -Bake for about 45-60 minutes, or until a lovely brown on top and the eggs have set up.
17. -Serve hot with a salad, serve cold with a salad, serve however you like!
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