Greens-Stuffed Bread Pocket (Spinach Fatayer)
Here's a restaurant-quality specialty bread that you can make at home in a snap. It's based on the spinach fatayer, a classic Middle Eastern bread. A hot, crispy crust wraps up sweet and savory greens, studded with nuts and raisins. It's amazing what exotic food you can make from basic kitchen ingredients.
Active time: 25 minutes, starting with prepared pizza dough. Total time: 37 minutes. Makes 4 servings, 1/2 pocket each.
Ingredients
two tennis-ball-sized pieces of pizza dough (I use the no-knead pizza dough from Cook for Good Basics)
1 tablespoon olive oil, plus olive oil for brushing finished pocket
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 pound fresh spinach or chard
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 cup raisins
sprinkle of coarse or kosher salt (optional)
Method
- Put a bread stone or a heavy, rimless cookie sheet on the bottom rack of your oven. Pre-heat oven to 500 degrees. Put dough on a floured sheet of parchment paper and let rest while you make the filling.
- In a large pan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil. Peel and mince garlic, then set aside. Peel and chop onion, then add to oil and cook until soft, about five minutes. Clean and chop greens. Add garlic to onion, stir once, and then add spinach or chard, nuts, and spices. Cook until greens are soft and mixture is dry.
- Meanwhile, flour top of each dough ball. Cover with another piece of parchment paper and roll out into a circle about 10 inches across and 1/4 inch thick.
- When greens are cooked, put half on one-half of each dough circle. Sprinkle with raisins. Use the parchment paper to fold uncovered dough over side with greens. Pinch edges shut. Cut four slits in each pocket, brush pocket with oil, and sprinkle with coarse or kosher salt if desired.
- Keeping each pocket on its parchment paper, slide it onto an unrimmed cookie sheet, then slide onto bread stone or pre-heated cookie sheet. Bake for about 12 minutes, until crust is crisp and golden brown.
- Serve at once. Refrigerate any extra, but best eaten immediately.
Tips and notes
- If you don't have a rimless cookie sheet, just turn a rimmed cookie sheet upside down.
- Usually I cook raisins with greens so the raisins will plump up, but this recipe uses them to trap extra water produced by the greens during baking, keeping the crust crispy.
