Homemade Spanakopita Recipe
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Get ready to BAKE bakers, this week we’re tackling the SHOWSTOPPER from Pie and Tart Week. The challenge was to make a pie made with a Homemade Filo Dough Recipe for the crust. I chose to tackle Glenn’s Spiral Spanakopita Recipe, classic spinach, and feta pie rolled in a unique spiral.
I just love how beautiful this Spanakopita with homemade filo dough turned out.
The challenge was to make a Showstopper Pie with a Filo Dough crust, filled with whatever the bakers envisioned. It had to be unique and have paper-thin layers. You say showstopper, I say heartstopper!
I went with Glenn’s Sprial Spanakopita Recipe because I have a child who asks for spinach every single week. Here you go, kid! Crispy homemade filo rolled paper-thin and stuffed with spinach and feta.
Where did I find the recipe for the spiral spanakopita? I had to use Paul Hollywood’s interpretation of the recipe. Unfortunately, this recipe hasn’t made it to the GBBO official site. I think it should be on the site!
What is Spanakopita?
If you’re still scratching your head asking what is spanakopita, no worries, it’s a Greek Spinach Hand Pie. Typically it’s folded into nice little triangle pockets of deliciousness. And for a while I was convinced that was the only way it was made. I live in Alaska, what do I know???
BUT after being IN Greece I found out the triangles are not the only way it’s done!
When we were in Athens we found a little deli on the street outside the museum, and it was amazing. We loved their peasant farmer’s pie, which was just a big fat slab of a spanakopita pie, served in a paper bag to carry and eat.
We actually made it a point to get off the bus with all of our bags and grab another batch to eat before we headed to the town of Marathon. Yes, they were that good.
Spinach and Feta Pie with walnuts
I reduced the amount of feta called for in Paul’s recipe and subbed in the same amount of parmesan. I did the same with some walnuts.
And I put chopped walnuts on top of the pie. I remembered from the show that Mary said someone should have put the nuts from the top of the pastry inside the pastry. So I took her advice.
Spiral Spanakopita Pie
Is the Spanakopita Spiral traditional? I’m not sure but looking it up I see lots of spiral or coil spanakopita recipes. I loved it on the show, so I wanted to recreate it.
Don’t want to coil up the roll of homemade filo and filling?
Easy make it like a Greek Spinach Pie. Brush your layers of filo with melted butter, fold them over and lay over a pie pan. Continue making layers, leaving a couple of sheets for the top. Add the filling, tuck the filo around and over it, and bake.
Homemade Filo Dough Recipe
The hardest part of the whole project is making the homemade filo dough. The filo dough recipe is easy as pie. It’s the stretching that will break you. The stretching of the dough reminds me of the Povitica from last year.
Paul’s recipe called for rolling the filo dough out using a pasta roller.
For a while, I was going to just go with the stretching and pulling but then I realized that if Paul could do I could it. So I broke down pulled out the pasta attachment for the KitchenAid.
The problem with using a pasta roller to roll out filo dough is that it only gets so wide. And then you still have to stretch it. It does about half the work for you.
Tips for Rolling Filo Dough with a KitchenAid Pasta Attachment:
- cover your work surface with tea towels, and sprinkle with corn starch-you can use flour too
- divide the dough for this filo dough recipe in 5 equal parts
- run each piece through the pasta machine several times on each setting until you hit the number five
- lay the filo dough on the prepared towel
- stretch with backs of your hands to as wide as you can get it, mine was about 7 inches wide at the widest
- brush with butter, and cover until the next dough is ready
- remember to stretch the dough on the prepared towel and then lay it on the rest of the filo dough
Can I Use Storebought Filo Dough?
You could. I made one WITH storebought and one WITH homemade filo dough. Hands down everyone in the house thought the Spanakopita Recipe with the homemade filo tasted best.
And making the spanakopita with storebought was a pain in the butt. Homemade was 100 times EASIER to work with, but also more work. Pick your poison!
PS I made Spanakopita with Puff pastry and it was AMAZING! If you need to make EASY and TASTY Spanakopita and you think store-bought filo is AWFUL to work with try that recipe!!
Spanakopita Recipe with Homemade Filo Dough
Ingredients
Filo Dough
- 1 1/3 cup bread flour
- pinch of salt
- 1/2 cup warm water
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 2 Tablespoons melted butter
- egg yolk for glazing
Spanakopita Filling
- 1 pounds frozen spinach cooked and well drained
- 3/4 cup crumbled feta
- 1/4 grated parmesan cheese
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts divided
- 1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
- 1 egg
Instructions
- Put the flour and salt in the bowl of a KitchenAid fitted with the dough hook
- mix the water and oil, pour in the bowl, and start the KitchenAid
- once the dough comes together let it knead the dough for about 2 minutes, KitchenAid says this is equivalent to 10-12 minutes of kneading
- when the dough is done, wrap it up and put it in the fridge to chill
- while it chills make the filling, begin with cooking the frozen spinach, either in the microwave or on the stovetop
- Once it’s cooked, drain it in a colander, cool completely, THEN squeeze out every remaining drop of liquid
- mix the spinach with the feta, parmesan, walnuts, lemon zest, and the nutmeg
- set aside to chill until ready to use
- when the dough is done resting
- melt the butter in a saucepan and set aside
- lay clean towels on a long work surface, sprinkle with corn starch
- divide the dough into 5 pieces
- run a piece through the KitchenAid pasta roller on the number one setting, continue rolling the dough through the machine moving up through the numbers until you hit five
- move the dough to the prepared towel, use the backs of your hands to gently stretch the dough as wide as possible
- brush with melted butter, cover while you work on the next piece
- repeat with all five pieces
- lay the filling down one long edge, fold over each end to keep the filling from leaking out
- roll the filo over to form a long snake, then coil around to make a flat circle
- slide on a greased baking sheet OR in a springform pan
- mixing any remaining melted butter with the egg yolk and brush over the top of the pie, sprinkle with the chopped walnut
- bake 350˚ for 35-45 minutes, or until the filo is flaky, and it’s baked through
- cool slightly, slice, and serve
