Spinach Cheese Empanadas

Spinach Cheese Empanadas

Popeye and Olive Oyl!!

I am grateful to E.C.Segar, creator of these characters.

Thanks to his Popeye and Olive Oyl, my kids, (when they were younger and did not understand that hubby and I were hoodwinking them) ate greens as they wanted to be like Popeye not Olive Oyl!

Now they will feed me the greens if I try the stunt on them.

It’s difficult to believe my little one is in seventh and is as tall as I am. Must tell her because I fed her Spinach.

Coming to today’s recipe …

I made this long time ago when there is fresh spinach available in the fields. Actually I had made it for International Marathon we had. Never got round to posting it.

 I will love to “ #FireUpYourOven” again for these.

Spinach Cheese Empanadas

Recipe source : here 

Ingredients:

Empanada Dough:

• 2 ¾cups whole wheat flour
• 1 cup water
• ¾ cup salted butter
• 1tsp salt
• Pinch chilli powder
• Spinach Cheese Filling:
• 1 tbsp butter
• 2 tblspn olive oil
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tsp chilli powder
• 200 grms fresh spinach stems removed, washed, chiffonade
• 1 cup ricotta cheese
• 225 grms mozzarella cheese, shredded or crumbled
• 2 tblspn Parmesan cheese, grated
• Salt and pepper to taste

Spinach Cheese Empanadas

Method:

Make the dough:

• Heat water and butter in a small bowl over medium heat until butter has melted.
• Mix flour and salt and chilli powder in a large mixing bowl.
• Make a well in the Pour a little of the warm liquid in and stir with fingertips to make a wet paste.
• Pour in remaining liquid and work the flour into the dough with your hand until you get wet, oily dough. 
• Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Make the filling:

• Heat the butter and olive oil in a medium kadhai/wok and sauté over medium-high heat until melted.
• Add the minced garlic and red chilli powder and sauté until the garlic becomes fragrant.
• Add the spinach and sauté until all the greens are wilted.
• Remove from heat. Stir the ricotta cheese, mozzarella cheese, Parmesan cheese, and cooked spinach together.
• Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Assemble the empanadas:

• Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F.
• Tear off pieces of dough to roll about 12 large or 24 small balls of dough.
• Using a rolling pin, roll out dough balls on lightly floured surface into circles thick circles as too thin dough because this filling can expand and burst the pastry if the dough is too thin or the empanada is over-stuffed with filling.
• Place 2-3 tbsp of filling in the centre of each dough circle.
• Fold over and press edges firmly to seal.
• Rope, pinch the edges tightly.
•  In this case, a good tight seal will also prevent oozing of cheese during the baking process. Place empanadas on cookie sheet and bake until golden brown, 20-25 minutes.
• Makes 12 large or 24 small empanadas.

Day 15

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 51

An InLinkz Link-up

Hi! First time here? Well then you are Most Welcome! I hope you keep coming back for more here. If you are my regular visitor then Thanks, for you encourage me to experiment more!! I would like you to please click on my link below and like my Facebook Page. I will be happy if you can follow me on on Twitter too!

 

Tabbouleh

In our trip around the world let’s visit Jordon today. Wondering what I am talking about? Then we at Blogging Marathon are dishing up the world in the next thirty days, aptly named “Around the world in 30 days!’ Join us and enjoy this trip…. Today in Jordan!

I am tired of all the street food (that is my daughter’s chosen theme for me) my family has been gorging on I will like a nice salad.  So this Tobbouleh fits in my scheme of food.

Eggless Quiche

 In continuation with Gayatri’s challenge for the Eggless baking group I am posting my Quiche recipe.

I have already written about the making of the base here now here is the filling and the finished quiche.

Let me warn you that even though I have never eaten Quiche before and I loved it.

  But then I am not a difficult person to please especially when it comes to food. :)

My younger daughter had promised me she will not, sorry “N-O-T” bold and underlined at that” eating quiche with all that palak/spinach and tofu yuck, “is now pestering me for the last slice that has escaped her mouth.

My husband and most importantly my FIL, yes My Father-in-Law loved it and ate it happily every time it was offered.

Palak Pulao

How super excited I am for I am a part of BloggingMarathon #13  and today is Day#1

I have chosen my theme as Rice.

Cool, yes well it is, till you try to feed your kids everyday rice, which does not happen in my place, but wait it has to be kid friendly and needs to ready in 20 minutes flat. And I am bombarded with suggestions. So there are lovely inputs that I have.

 Let’s begin at the very beginning

 1.I had made this spinach and garlic onion stir fry as a stuffing for lasagne. It did not happen poor thing was lying in the fridge quite lonesome.

2. Then I don’t know why I made a big batch of rice.

 3. Thanks to Raksha's post that I read here and this is how the idea cascaded into this lovely dish.

And was it appreciated? Serve it with paneer Manchurian and be labelled as the “besttest Mamma”!  

So we here it is   Palak Pulao as our entry for the first day of blogging marathon.

Kandya- che-Appe

One recipe that had caught my eye long ago was on Priya’s Blog at Now Serving was Baked Pakoda.

And the wonder of wonders I followed her instructions the only place I deviated was( when I the kids got hungry and wanted immediate feeding ) I had to get out my appe patra also know  as gunpangala or paniyaram tava. 

They disappeared as fast as they appeared on the plate. Barely managed the pics.

Here is the original recipe.

Thus ends the story of baked pakaoda which turned into Kandya-che -Appe as my niece called them!!
Thanks Priya this one rocks!!

Sending this to Bookmarked Recipes by Aipi and Priya

Kalyani's Valentine Fest-Served with love

Sangeetha's Show me your Hits

Archana

Palak Salad 2

I was to post a soup recipe today but there is a small hitch I have not made it as yet. I cannot decide if I want to make Lung Fung Soup or Hot and Sour as I want a Chinese soup.

Given a choice Hubby will say Sweet Corn, Elder one something exotic which though a challenge is not what I want to make and younger one Tomato Soup. So I am feeling like Atlas right now.

So folks bear with me and try this salad. It’s again, oh no as kids said, palak/spinach   and potatoes but a Tarla Dalal one! Put an end to the girls’ protests too! J

Well I put up with the garlic too just because it was Tarla Dalal recipe! Made a few changes which I have marked. also I have omitted the milk powder as I don't like the smell of it you can use it if you want about 2 tblspn. 

Cal de Verde

We are supposed to go to Catholic wedding today night.

 In Goa a Catholic wedding is called”KaJar” there are nuptials in the church and then a reception in hall. There is  lot of music, dance and food.  Since food will be served late and the kids will be stuffing themselves with soft drinks and snacks served earlier  I wanted  the kids to eat something filling and hot.

You guessed it we had soup! And this is my entry for BM Day #3 Group2!

Palak Chakali~ Blog Hop #6

F or today’s Blog Hop the brain child of Radhika I am paired with Suchitra of  Simple Indian Food. Not only does Suchitra have an enormous number of recipes she has also featured new budding bloggers in her blog.

I have bookmarked quite a few recipes to be tried later.  But being festive season I was keen on trying some savories. But savories I wanted had to have some health quotient in them, what better way to have them but to add veggies.

Potato and Spinach Kabab?

W hat do you when you have potatoes, that ane not too big to be called small potatoes and not too small to be called baby potatoes?

What do you do when you have palak that has about given up on you?

Cook them together right?

 That is exactly what I have done here. Since I am not too sure about the classification of this dish I have called it Kabab?

Soya Spinach Cutlets

The other day I wanted to make something different for our dinner. So I decided to make burgers. Next for once I listed out the things that I would need.

1. White sauce,

 2.  Onion rings, tomatoes lettuce,

 3. Cheese,

 4. Buns and the cutlets to go in the buns.

I had the salad ingredients so I decided to make the white sauce and the cutlets.

For the cutlets I used soya chunks and spinach and made them in the morning. 

By the time I came back from work the cutlets were all gone except 4 cutlets. “Two each for both of you” I was told.

These are the snaps of the leftover cutlets that I had with salad and green chutney that I whipped up to eat with the buns.

Ingredients:

1 bunch of spinach, washed, picked and chopped

1 pinch soda

7 Soya chunks

3 cloves garlic, crushed

1 onion finely chopped

1 tblspn tomato ketchup

1 tsp chilli powder (adjust as per taste)

2 potatoes, boiled, peeled and grated

Garam masala (optional) (I do not use this)

2 cups bread crumbs

Corn flour

Oil

Salt

Method:

1.       Heat sufficient water with a pinch of soda in a wide vessel and when it boils add the spinach. Keep a colander ready after 1 minute pour out the boiling water and spinach and immediately dip the spinach in ice cold water. This preserves the deep green colour of the spinach but as I did not have ice I used the tap water. Let the spinach dry.

2.       I added the Soya chunks in warm salted water. Squeezed them and soaked them again. (This I believe is a mistake should have boiled them.)Then after 15 minutes squeeze the chunks and since they were big I shredded them to a fine.

3.       Next in a kadhai/wok heat 1 tblspn oil add the crushed garlic and fry till brown.

4.       Add the onions and fry till translucent. Add the chilli powder, garam masala if you are using it. Stir.

5.       Add the Soya chunks and stir fry till the water evaporates.

6.       Add the spinach and stir fry for about ½ a minute. Then add the potatoes, salt. Mix well.

7.       Cool and add the bread crumbs. Adjust the salt.

8.       Mix well to form soft dough. In case it is sticky add the cornflour and mix well.

9.       Make balls and flatten them.

10.   Shallow fry them with a little oil on a tava till reddish in both sides.

11.   Keep aside.

Reposting Franky or Wraps

The basic wrap(no salads at all)

Since we were supposed to visit friends and I had to cook only for my FIL.

 I cannot cook for one person and hence the Peas Palak that I had made was too much for him and for the rest of us to finish in the evening. As I did not want to throw it out I made "Franky"(basically I am reposting Franky)  as we called it in the past. Now I would prefer to call it "Wrap" but the name "Franky" is stuck with the kids and hence we and  so franky it is!

You can use the Hara Bhara Kabab Recipe and make the same cutlets. Only today ground the peas palak with green chillies and added 1 1/2  cup of rolled oats to the dough to make the dough into a smooth and not too free flowing. The cutlets I made are longish and I rolled them in oats. The shallow cutlets are wrapped in chappati smeared with cheese spread and tomato sauce. 

 The only photographs I had taken were when Akanksha, my younger daughter was eating there are no salads in it. You can add tomatoes, onions and capsicum. They taste better!!

Longish cutlets ready for the fry pan

My younger daughter's wrap getting ready(no salad lots of ketchup)

P.S. You can also use green chutney and tamarind chutney as a spread.

Garlic chutney and dates chutney.
I am sending this entry to Priya's Priyas's Easy N Tasty Recipes  Cooking With Whole Foods - Oats and Kiran of Sumudra's Cooking with Whole Foods(CWF)

I am sending this entry to http://torviewtoronto.blogspot.com/

Hara Bhara Kabab

Things have become pretty hectic in Office and so I have not blogged or visited any of my fellow bloggers.  I intend to rectify this now on.

Hara Bhara Kabab  is something that had made some time ago I came across the photograph and remembered that I had not blogged this.

I made this when my kids told me to make them  when they saw me blanching some palak, leftover after making palak salad.

Here is what I did

Ingredients:

1 cup spinach/ palak, blanched

½ cup peas, steamed with a little salt

2 green chillies

2 cloves garlic (optional)

A handful of coriander

2 big potatoes, boiled

6 sliced of bread soaked in water and squeezed dry

Salt

Rava/bread crumbs

Oil to fry

Method:

1.       Grind to a fine paste the palak/spinach, peas, green chillies, garlic, coriander.

2.       In a big bowl grate the boiled potatoes.  Ad the palak and bread mixture.

3.       Add the salt. Mix to make the dough. ( Do not knead it  a lot as it becomes sticky).

4.       Apply a little oil to your hands and Make small flat balls with the dough.

5.        In a bowl add the rava or bread crumbs  and coat the balls with the mixture.

6.        Shallow fry with a little oil. Reddish on both the sides.

7.       Serve hot. Here I have served with pungent red chutney and tamarind chutney.

Muddi Palaya( Golaa Bhaji)

'Muddi pallaya' and rice or 'bhakri' i.e. jowar roti was a favourite among us siblings. My kids also like Muddi pallaya. The method I had to relearn, as my kids liked more of Savita Mami's pallaya. I tried it often but since I am a slow learner I tend to forget the ingredients and the process. Hence this essay.

Mami made it out of Palak, methi and Pundi Pallaya –this is a sour vegetable. Her instructions were if no pundi pallaya is available use tamarind.

I have after a lot of trial and error discovered that the pallaya tastes better if you use the daal to thicken the vegetable. The easiest way I have found is to cook more daal and add till the whole thing thickens to one homogeneous mass.

Wash and cut the green leafy vegetables.
Cook toor daal.
Put in the vegetables and cook covered.
Add the cooked daal and tamarind if you are not using some sour leafy vegetable you can also add jaggary.
Grind together green chilli, jeera, asafoetida, coriander and garlic.
Add to mixture add salt.
In oil add mustard, asafoetida, curry leaves, dry chillies, urid daal, jeera, methi seeds and garlic and pour over the cooked vegetable. Mix and serve.

P.S. take care that your methi seeds do not blacken as this will make your vegetable bitter.

Palak Salad

1 cup palak chopped fine
½ cup freshly grated coconut
1 small onion chopped fine
1 green chilli slit
3-4 cloves of garlic
Salt to taste

Mix all the ingredients and serve.

Palak Paneer

Palak Paneer

This recipe is an adaptation of Sanjeev Kapoors recipe. You can use potatoes,peas,corn kernels in place of paneer. Nothing beats paneer in palak.

Ingredients:

.

Paneer 200 gms.

Spinach (palak) 4 bunches

Onion 1 no

garlic paste 2 tsp.

Tomato1nos.

Pav Bhaji Masala ½ tsp.

1 tsp.Oil2 tbsp

Salt to taste

Method

1. Pick, wash and soak palak in boiling water for a minute then immediately transfer in ice-cold water.

2. Grind boiled palak coarsely with a chilli.

3. Chop onion. Puree the tomatoes.

4. Add oil in a pan and heat. Add the garlic paste.

5 when the garlic becomes brownish add the onions.

6 .Next add the tomato puree and cook till oil leaves the pan.

7.Now add the Pav Bhaji Masala and palak. Add the paneer Mix well.

8.dd salt.