Spanakopita Spirals With Spinach and Cheese

Spanakopita is a fairly popular Mediterranean dish consisting of spinach and cheese filing sandwiched between layers of very thin phyllo pastry. It is usually made in a deep baking pan and once baked, it's simply sliced into portions. I'm always looking for ways to make my dinners into single serving, preferably hand-held meals, so I can take any leftovers to work and eat it on the go.

Although this recipe is mainly just spinach and cheese, it's very filling and you won't need much. I usually double the recipe, I use half to make spirals for lunches and half to make regular spanakopita pie.

400g (one box) phyllo

600g spinach

1 small onion + 3 garlic cloves

3 eggs

200g feta cheese

200g ricotta

1/4-1/3 cup olive oil

3-4 tablespoons chopped dill (or dried)

pinch of nutmeg

salt, pepper

SPINACH:
Fresh- you need to boil a pot of water and wilt the spinach leaves until they decrease in volume. Transfer to a colander and leave it out until all water is drained. Use your hands to squeeze extra moisture out and chop the leaves into smaller pieces.
Frozen- leave the spinach out overnight, once it's thawed you will be able to squeeze extra moisture out using your hands and then chop the leaves into smaller pieces.

ONION AND GARLIC:
Dice an onion into tiny cubes and fry with a tablespoon of olive oil until translucent. Add minced garlic and fry on medium heat for 2-3 minutes. Take it off the heat and leave it until needed.

FETA:
Crumble it with a fork into small pieces.

PHYLLO PASTRY:
While working with it, it has to be kept moist, otherwise it will dry out, become fragile and starts to rip. Unfold it from the box and keep it sandwiched between two sheets of moist paper towel.

Mix all ingredients except for spinach. Once mixed, add dill, nutmeg, pepper and approximately 1 teaspoon of fine salt. Give it a good mix until well combined.

Add spinach and mix until well combined. If you have pastry bags or Ziploc bags, transfer the spinach mixture into a bag, so you can pipe it out. If you don't have the bags, just use a spoon to transfer the mixture onto the pastry.

I like to place a sheet of cling film on the work surface, it will help to fold the fragile filo dough and prevent tearing.

Place one sheet on the cling film, dribble some olive oil on top and use your hand to distribute it all over the sheet. Place another sheet down, make sure it overlaps the first one by about 1 inch and oil that sheet as well. [You can use a pastry brush to brush oil onto the dough, but I've found that you use a lot more oil to cover the whole sheet using this method, and it takes longer, because you have to be careful not to tear the dough with the bristles.]

Pipe a line of spinach filling, it should be as thick as a thumb.

Gently roll the pastry to create a thin snake. Brush that snake with some oil and gently bend it into the shape of a spiral.

Once the spirals are ready, sprinkle them with salt flakes and black sesame seeds, nigella seeds or poppy seeds.

Bake at 180°C for 35-45 minutes.

Note the third spiral on the tray. It was made with a sheet of pastry that dried up while I was distracted, it was still usable once I covered it with a moist towel to regain some moisture, but it wasn't as flexible as before and began to ear up while I was bending it.