Little savoury pies with nettles, spearmint and myzithra cheese

Home made phyllo for these little traditional pies makes them even more delicious. Little pies like these are always welcomed at home since they can be served anytime and in any occasion or season. Nettles are not the most popular or common ingredient for pies in Greece but lately I discovered that there are actually many traditional recipes around Greece using this, not so famous, green

Recipe adapted from "Cook Book" of "ETHNOS" newspaper

 

Ingredients

For the home made phyllo:
1Kg of all-purpose flour
60ml of olive oil
60ml of plain vinegar
1 egg
400ml of lukewarm water

For the filling:
500gr. of Greek fresh myzithra or anthotyro cheese (substitute with goat's cheese)
1 bunch of nettles, the tender leaves cleaned and roughly chopped
½ a bunch of spearmint, finely chopped
salt
pepper

Method:
In a large bowl put the nettles with the salt and rub with your hands so the greens will get softer and lightly wilt. Add the rest of the filling ingredients in the bowl and mix well. Leave on the side for later.

For the dough, mix in a large bowl the dry ingredients and start adding the water little by little, while you are kneading, until you get a smooth and easy to handle dough. Form the dough into a ball and leave to rest for a few minutes.

Preheat the oven to 170°C and lay with baking paper a couple of baking sheets.

Get pieces of the dough and using a rolling pin roll out into round phyllo sheets of medium thickness. Using a cutter of 7cm diameter cut the dough into discs.

Fill each disc with a heaped tablespoon of the filling, fold into half moons and press the edges with a fork to seal the dough and enclose the filling. Continue in the same way until you use up all the dough and the filling.

Place the pies on the baking sheets and bake for about 15-20 minutes until the pies are cooked through and get nicely coloured.

Leave the pies to cool for a while before serving. They can be eaten warm or at room temperature.