Spanakopita - GREECE

I took a break from Vegan MoFo yesterday, partly because it was my day off from work and it seems silly for a chef to be cooking on their only day off, but mainly because the night before I was introduced to a Scottish drink called Buckfast and I spent all of the next day nursing a hangover and wishing I hadn't. Today I'm back on track making an old childhood favourite of mine.
Spanakopita (or spinach pie) is a traditional Greek savory pastry, usually made with spinach, egg and a combination of feta and ricotta cheese. There are many vegan versions of Spanakopita but I made mine with a tofu ricotta recipe from my favourite cook book Veganomicon.

SPANAKOPITA - GREECE

 

Ingredients:

1 pack of filo pastry

500 grams spinach, washed

tbs margarine, melted or olive oil

1 pack firm tofu

1 clove garlic, minced

2 tsp lemon juice

1 tbs olive oil

1/4 nutritional yeast

salt and pepper

chives, finely chopped

Instructions:

To make the tofu ricotta, first roughly mash the tofu up with a fork, leave it a little lumpy, add the minced garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, nutritional yeast, chives salt and pepper and mix together. 

Then blanch the spinach in boiling water, drain well and roughly chop, add to the tofu ricotta and mix. Taste and add more seasoning if needed.

For the filo, measure using the size of the oven dish you are using and cut them to fit the bottom. Grease the oven dish. Add the filo, piece by piece using a pastry brush to grease with the melted margarine to each piece of filo before adding the next, use about half of the filo for the bottom. Add the spinach and ricotta mixture. Then layer the rest of the filo on top using the same method. Bake at 180 degrees for 30 - 40 minutes.