This is what comes of watching daytime TV. I was home not feeling too well, and indulgled my self in TV land.
Rachel Ray was cooking up this Spinach Artichoke Ricotta pie on her show, and it caught my eye, so I made it a week or so later. I have more than one package of fillo dough languishing (I always say that!) in my freezer, so used one I’d picked up at a Middle Eastern market that is thicker, country style, called Horiatiko – sounds Japanese, doesn’t it?! (There are all kinds on amazon, including one that sounds German or Polish, Bosanska Jufka.)
See how messy my fillo is? Even this thicker type was still pretty thin, and since it had suffered in the freezer, it fell apart as I worked with it. The heck with single layers! I plumphed it in the springform pan as best as I could, with the edges hanging out, put in the filling, and folded the overhanging laps over the top of the pie.
A brush with butter and into the oven, and I have to say the result really pleased me. I like the stormy sea (or buckled road?) surface, which looked interesting and didn’t hurt the “integrity” of the pie at all. I used a lower fat ricotta, so even with an egg and a few tablespoons of butter, this doesn’t strike me as too sinful a dish, with all those vegetables in it, and I enjoyed it for dinner plus workday lunches during the following week. A good dish for entertaining company, too, I might add.
NJ SPICE 