Spinach, pine nut and fetta gozleme

We are very spoilt in our neighbourhood. We have one of Sydney's best-known Saturday markets at the local school. Clothing, jewellery, music - it's all there in abundance as are the colourful locals and visitors that swarm the area every weekend. And then there's the amazing variety of food - the Turkish Gozleme stand is a favourite.

I never thought I would be using the words home-made and gozleme together but yes, last week, I subjected my family to a trial run of a recipe I had found in an old Real Living magazine (my favourite 'lifestyle' magazine). It tasted fabulous and thankfully, the family agreed. 

This recipe contains gluten. I'm not sure how well the dough would work out if you replaced the regular flour with gluten-free flour but it might be worth a try. 
Preparation time: 25 minutes
Cooking time: 10 minutes

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups of plain flour
1 tsp of salt
1/3 cup of olive oil
3/4 cup of water
2 tbsp of pine nuts
A pinch of ground nutmeg
2 green onions finely sliced
150g of baby spinach leaves
150g Danish feta - crumbled
1 1/2 cups of mozzarella
Cracked black pepper
Salt
Oil spray - olive or or vegetable
Lemon wedges and a leafy green salad to serve

The 'How to'

1. Making the dough 
Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Make a well in the centre and add the oil and water stir to combine. Turn the mixture on to a flat surface and knead until the dough becomes smooth and elastic. This can take anywhere between 5 and 10 minutes depending on your kneading skills and muscles. Place dough in a clean bowl and cover with a cloth. Ignore it for about 10 minutes.

2. Making the delicious filling
Pop the pine nuts in a frying pan and toast for a few minutes until they are golden brown and then remove from heat. Keep an eye on them...they start tanning relatively quickly. I had to do a second batch after I walked off and let the first burn. That would be the story of my cooking life...

Pop the nuts into a clean bowl along with the spinach, nutmeg, green onions, feta and mozzarella. Add salt and pepper to taste - remembering that feta can be quite salty so maybe hold back on the salt a little. Or maybe not - depends on your taste.

3. Back to the dough
I must admit I was shocked when I starting rolling out the dough. Baking and flour-related meals have never been my forte so I was most surprised to discover that my dough had indeed been a success.

Divide the dough into four pieces and roll each piece out to form a 30cm circle - about the same size as a tortilla. Place half of the spinach filling in the centre of two dough circles - leave about a 1 1/2cm border around the edges. Top with the remaining two dough circles, flatten and press the edges together to seal.

4. Cooking the goodness
Spray a frying pan with the oil (use two frying pans at once to cut back on cooking time if you can). Carefully place** the gozleme onto the pans and cook on each side for about 5 minutes - I cooked mine for a little longer to get it nice and brown. Don't forget to spray the pan when you flip them over to avoid them sticking.

** My dough was very soft so I sprayed the pan, put on the first circle, then stuffing and covered with the second piece - all done whilst it sat in the pan. Just be carefully so as to not burn yourself (as I did) if you choose this method.

The gozlemes are ready to enjoy - serve up with a gorgeous green salad and some lemon wedges. Yum.