Gozleme

Because I’m going away soon, I want to empty the fridge, so I was trying to think of what I could cook with whatever I had left. I had half a container of Greek yoghurt, some fetta, and some baby spinach leaves, so I thought “Gozleme,” which is a delicious Turkish pastry filled with spinach and cheese. I often buy hot and fresh it at the market but this time I wanted to make it myself.

I remember reading somewhere that the gozleme pastry could also be made with yoghurt, and I probably should have looked it up, but I didn’t.  When I’m cooking just for myself, I often make things by guess, and then, depending on how they went, look up a recipe. Yes, not smart, I know, but it works for me. Usually. <g>

So I popped a large spoonful of yoghurt into a bowl and added flour bit by bit, mixing it in with the spoon and adding more by feel. Then I kneaded it by hand a little and decided it was a bit stiff, so I added a glug of olive oil and kneaded that in. Not too much kneading — it’s not like bread.

Then I let it rest while I steamed up the spinach, and once it was wilted, pressed it between paper towels until it wasn’t wet anymore.

I divided the dough into two pieces, rolled one out thin, and put the spinach and crumbled fetta on half of it. I then folded it over and squished the edges together, then cooked it in a preheated pan on the top of the stove with a little oil. I put a lid on the pan. 

After a couple of minutes I flipped it over, and that side was already a lovely golden brown, so I cooked the other side and slid it onto a plate. It was delicious — and amazingly easy.

That was yesterday and today I thought I might make another one with the second lump of dough, only with a mushroom filling. But when I went out to the vegie patch to grab some thyme — my favorite way to cook mushrooms is with garlic and thyme — I noticed my silver beet was booming along, so I cut some leaves, washed them, and steamed them to make another spinach gozleme. 

This time the filling was much thicker — that’s it above— partly because the silver beet leaves are more robust,  but also because  I put more in and I used up a few spring onions and extra cheese as well. Proper Turkish gozleme are quite thin and delicate, but mine were much thicker. But they still tasted delicious.

If you want to try it and don’t like to experiment as I did, here’s a recipe for gozleme made with yoghurt. Traditionally the pastry is made with just flour and water, and there are loads of recipes for that on the web. But this was so quick and easy, I’ll be making it again, that’s for sure.