Belated New Recipe Sunday: Further Scrumptiousness
Last Sunday evening saw the first New Recipe night of 2009. It's become something of a cliché to say "OMG NOM the foodz!" but really, OMG NOM the foodz! Once again a great spread and not a stinker among them. sabotabby has the photos.
Who did what:
Cooling crunchy salad: thegiantkiller
Roasted vegetable panzanella (Italian bread salad): Yours truly
Squashokopita (Squash and filo pie): Picturegal (friend from Grunk&Co., where I work)
Quinoa with currants and almonds, and chickpeas with garlic and ginger: mycrazyhair
Garlicky greens: neeuqdrazil
Cholesterol Pie (frittata with cheese and other good things): curgoth
and for dessert, Junior Mint Cheesecake: sabotabby
Roasted-vegetable panzanella
I halved this recipe from epicurious.com, with a few modifications:
I used a country wheat batard, rather than crusty white bread, because at 16h00 on a Sunday, this was the available crusty bread. It worked nicely, I thought, as the bread was still nice and crusty, but the whole wheat brought its own nutty flavour to the salad. I would keep this modification, though I should, at some point, try the recipe as written, with the white baguette. I might have roasted the tomatoes a bit too long. This was not a disaster, they were just a bit more mushy and falling-apart than I think the recipe wanted. Because captainmushroom was unable to join us, and because I had half a sweet red pepper to use up, I roasted that with the green beans. I added about a cup of toasted pine-nuts to the finished product. They made a good addition.
I generally don't like capers, but the smooshed capers worked in the sauce for this, and didn't overpower. If I make this again (and I very likely will!), I'd remember to salt the mozzarella before using it, and I'd also use more mozzarella. Overall, though, I thought this was a nice recipe-it needed a fair bit of prep, and was not necessarily a weeknight, one-pot recipe, but it wasn't too time consuming, it made lots, and it was easy-to-follow and very forgiving. Also nomtastic.
ETA: Picturegal's Savoury Greek Pumpkin Pie (aka Squashkopita or, if you want to be all authentic about it Kolokithopita)
What You Need
● 16 sheets filo pastry, defrosted
● 4 tbsp, plus about 3/4 c. olive oil
● 1 good sized onion, peeled and cut into fine half rings
● about 6 1/2 cups coarsely grated pumpkin flesh (butternut squash would probably work well too)
● 2 tsp salt
● 2-3 tsp sugar
● freshly ground black pepper
● 1 egg, beaten
● 6 oz feta cheese, crumbled
What You Do
Heat the 4 tbsp of oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Fry the onion in the hot oil, until soft, turning the heat down, if necessary. Add the pumpkin, and turn the heat back to medium-high (if you turned it down). Fry, stirring, for 8-10 minutes, or until the pumpkin is soft. Stir in the salt, sugar, and black pepper. Allow the squash to cool, and stir in the beaten egg and crumbled feta.
Preheat oven to 400 ºF.
Generously oil a 9 ✕ 9-inch baking pan.
Now is the time to work quickly with the filo. Spread one sheet out on a clean, dry surface, and brush generously with oil. Lay it inside the baking pan, leaving 2 inches sticking out on all sides. Put 3 more sheets over the first one, brushing each with oil before you put it in the pan. Cover the sticking-out edges with a clean towel, so they don't dry out.
Divide the pumpkin mixture into 4 parts. Spread 1 part over the last filo sheet in the pan. Cover with 2 more oil-brushed filo sheets. You can trim or fold some of the excess over, but leave a bit sticking out of the pan. Spread another batch of squash, and top with another 2 sheets of filo. Keep doing this, until all the stuffing is used up. Brush the top with oil. Roll the pastry ends in, to form a neat edge to your pie. Brush the edges with oil. With a sharp knife, cut rows 2 1/4 inchea apart, then cut them on the diagonal to form diamonds.
Bake for 45 minutes, or until brown on top. Serve warm.
Who did what:
Cooling crunchy salad: thegiantkiller
Roasted vegetable panzanella (Italian bread salad): Yours truly
Squashokopita (Squash and filo pie): Picturegal (friend from Grunk&Co., where I work)
Quinoa with currants and almonds, and chickpeas with garlic and ginger: mycrazyhair
Garlicky greens: neeuqdrazil
Cholesterol Pie (frittata with cheese and other good things): curgoth
and for dessert, Junior Mint Cheesecake: sabotabby
Roasted-vegetable panzanella
I halved this recipe from epicurious.com, with a few modifications:
I generally don't like capers, but the smooshed capers worked in the sauce for this, and didn't overpower. If I make this again (and I very likely will!), I'd remember to salt the mozzarella before using it, and I'd also use more mozzarella. Overall, though, I thought this was a nice recipe-it needed a fair bit of prep, and was not necessarily a weeknight, one-pot recipe, but it wasn't too time consuming, it made lots, and it was easy-to-follow and very forgiving. Also nomtastic.
ETA: Picturegal's Savoury Greek Pumpkin Pie (aka Squashkopita or, if you want to be all authentic about it Kolokithopita)
What You Need
● 16 sheets filo pastry, defrosted
● 4 tbsp, plus about 3/4 c. olive oil
● 1 good sized onion, peeled and cut into fine half rings
● about 6 1/2 cups coarsely grated pumpkin flesh (butternut squash would probably work well too)
● 2 tsp salt
● 2-3 tsp sugar
● freshly ground black pepper
● 1 egg, beaten
● 6 oz feta cheese, crumbled
What You Do
Heat the 4 tbsp of oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Fry the onion in the hot oil, until soft, turning the heat down, if necessary. Add the pumpkin, and turn the heat back to medium-high (if you turned it down). Fry, stirring, for 8-10 minutes, or until the pumpkin is soft. Stir in the salt, sugar, and black pepper. Allow the squash to cool, and stir in the beaten egg and crumbled feta.
Preheat oven to 400 ºF.
Generously oil a 9 ✕ 9-inch baking pan.
Now is the time to work quickly with the filo. Spread one sheet out on a clean, dry surface, and brush generously with oil. Lay it inside the baking pan, leaving 2 inches sticking out on all sides. Put 3 more sheets over the first one, brushing each with oil before you put it in the pan. Cover the sticking-out edges with a clean towel, so they don't dry out.
Divide the pumpkin mixture into 4 parts. Spread 1 part over the last filo sheet in the pan. Cover with 2 more oil-brushed filo sheets. You can trim or fold some of the excess over, but leave a bit sticking out of the pan. Spread another batch of squash, and top with another 2 sheets of filo. Keep doing this, until all the stuffing is used up. Brush the top with oil. Roll the pastry ends in, to form a neat edge to your pie. Brush the edges with oil. With a sharp knife, cut rows 2 1/4 inchea apart, then cut them on the diagonal to form diamonds.
Bake for 45 minutes, or until brown on top. Serve warm.