Spanikopita
olive oil, as needed
1 small onion, chopped
1 (16 ounce) can chickpeas, reserve liquid
1 tablespoon thyme
1 tablespoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon cumin
3 cups loose leaf spinach
1/4 cup vegan margarine (I use Earth Balance)
1/4 pound vegan phyllo dough, thawed
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Coat saucepan with olive oil and saute onions on low heat for 3 minutes. Add chickpeas with liquid to pan, along with the spices.
2. Stir on medium heat for 10 minutes. Add spinach, and stir until cooked. Pour into food processor and blend until the mixture is slightly smooth but has some texture.
3. Melt vegan margarine to coat bottom of 9" pie tin and to pour in between layers of phyllo. Layer the bottom of pie tin with 5-7 sheets of phyllo. Pour portion of chickpea mixture on phyllo, along with portion of melted vegan margarine.
4. Top with 3-5 sheets of phyllo, repeat until done, finishing with a top layer of 3 sheets and the remainder of the melted vegan margarine to make the top crispy and buttery. Bake for 30 minutes, remove when golden-brown.
Source of recipe: This is a recipe that my boyfriend and I came up with in our attempt to prepare a Greek meal minus the feta. There is a lot of multi-tasking involved, but the results are well worth the effort!
SO HOW'D IT GO?
This was really tasty! Even the nonvegans in the house liked this one. A little spicy- we are not into heat, BUT, it was not overwhelming. Easy to make, best to premeasure the seasonings. Will definitely try again.
Not bad. I used an 8x8 inch glass pan and it worked great. I did add two layers between the other two of chickpeas/spinach of tomato based pasta sauce with eggplant, added a clove of garlic with salt and pepper. Will make again, with my personal modifications, but spices were great :)
I've made this before and it is really good. I don't know about the comment that claimed it was fattening. Maybe if you eat the whole thing but you will use tofu instead of real fattening feta and vegan margarine instead of really fattening butter. The dough only has 1 gram of fat per serving. So eat the whole thing!!!!
This was actually really good! at first i wasn't sure how the spices would be, so only used 1 tsp. each of thyme paprika & cumin, but then tasted & it seemed kind of bland, so added a heaping tsp more of each. Also added in about 2 good hand-fulls of pine nuts, juice of 1/2 a lemon, 1 clove of garlic and some salt & pepper. it came out really delicious & i'll surely be making this again. next time i might try layering more phyllo on the bottom, because it seemed to kind of melt into it... but for my first time using phyllo & making spanikopita, i'd say it was perfect!