Oven-baked zucchini and tomatoes with herbed feta cream

We've had a really good crop of courgettes/zucchini and tomatoes this year (our first year of backyard gardening, remember), and I'm trying and adapting different recipes. Here's a really simple dish showcasing both the zucchini and tomatoes, complemented by a herbed feta cream, giving it a Greek touch. Lovely as a vegetarian main dish, or as a side dish for some simple grilled meat (lamb, perhaps).

Oven-baked zucchini and tomatoes with herbed feta cream
(Suvikõrvitsa-tomativorm fetakreemiga)
Serves 4

2 green or yellow courgettes/zucchini
8 small ripe tomatoes
4-6 large garlic cloves
250 g feta cheese (softer feta-style cheese is fine here)
4 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil + more for drizzling
2 Tbsp chopped fresh basil
1 tsp dried oregano
freshly ground black pepper
sea salt

Cut the zucchini into 1 cm (just under 1/2 inch) slices. Cut tomatoes into quarters. Peel the garlic cloves.
Take a large baking dish, oil it slightly. Layer zucchini slices and tomato quarters into the baking try, push garlic cloves between the vegetables.
Place feta cheese, olive oil, chopped basil and dried oregano into a medium-sized bowl and mash using a fork. Season with black pepper. Scatter the mixture over the vegetables.
Season with some more black pepper, drizzle with olive oil.
Bake in a preheated 200 C oven for about 45-60 minutes, until vegetables are cooked and cheese golden brown.

Wild garlic tzatziki aka Ramson tzatziki

I decided to give the ever-popular Greek condiment/salad, tzatziki, a seasonal makeover, using the wild garlic that grows just about 7 minutes from our house. I love the basic tzatziki - yogurt, fresh cucumber and finely chopped garlic. However, when trying to think of new ways of using my wild garlic bounty, it suddenly occured to me that it would make an excellent tzatziki. By simply substituting finely chopped wild garlic for garlic, you'll still get the garlic flavour, but with a twist and lots of extra colour.

Use as you would the regular tzatziki - for dipping, as a condiment or simply as one of the dishes on a spring-time Greek mezze platter. Healthy and really delicious!!!

Note that wild garlic = ramson = bear's garlic (Allium ursinum). If you live in Tallinn, you'll find bunches of wild garlic in all of the three markets (Keskturg, Balti jaama turg, Nõmme turg).

Wild garlic tzatziki
(Karulaugu tzatziki)
Serves 4



2 long or 6-8 short cucumbers
1 tsp salt
a large bunch of wild garlic
250 g plain (Greek) yogurt

Wash the cucumber and grate coarsely. Put on a colander, sprinkle with salt and let stand for 30 minutes.
Finely chop the wild garlic.
Mix wild garlic, drained cucumber and yogurt in a bowl, season with salt, if necessary.

You can vary the thickness of your tzatziki by using either a strained Greek yogurt (first photo) or ordinary plain yogurt (second photo).

Kourkouto aka Greek Zucchini Pie

There's a dish that made rounds in foodblogs last summer. The author of the original recipe was a Greek chef Dina Nikolaou. Her recipe was picked up and adapted by Peter of the Kalofagas, and the rest was history. I then spotted it on my dear friend's Alanna's blog, and earlier this year on Farida's blog. I bet there are many more :)

We had this for dinner tonight. I made some changes, leaving out the Kasseri cheese and upping the amount of feta cheese. I also added some dried oregano to the dish, a herb I always associate with my visits to Greece. Overall, this is an excellent supper dish - either with a light salad, as Peter recommends, or with flash-fried chicken strips, as we did. It's delicious both hot and cold, making it ideal for summer brunches and buffets.

Greek Courgette Pie Kourkouto
(Kreeka suvikõrvitsavorm)
Serves 6 to 8



100 ml olive oil
1 kg courgettes/zucchini (4-5 younger ones)
2 large onions
0.5 tsp salt
1 tsp dried oregano
6 large eggs
250 g plain yogurt
150 g plain/all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
200 g feta cheese
a large handful of fresh parsley
salt and freshly ground black pepper

To garnish:
1 slender green courgette
mild paprika powder

Preheat the oven to 180 C / 350 F.
Peel and chop the onions. Cut the courgettes/zucchini into small cubes.
Heat oil in a heavy-bottomed saucepan, add zucchini and onion cubes. Season with salt and oregano and heat over a moderate heat for 15 minutes, until the vegetables are soft, but not mushy.
Meanwhile, whisk eggs with yogurt until combined. Stir in baking powder and flour, then add feta cubes.
Using a slotted spoon, transfer the cooked vegetables into the batter. Add parsley, and stir until combined.
Pour into a well-buttered or lined oven dish, sized 25x35 cm.
Slice the extra zucchini into 5-6 mm rounds, then place nicely on top of the dish. Sprinkle with paprika powder.
Bake in the middle of the preheated oven for about 30 minutes, until cooked through and nicely golden on top.

It's a wild thing: hortapita or a Greek pie with wild greens

On a gorgeous Sunday in early May K. and I walked along the paths of my - sorry, our - childhood summers. Literally. And during that walk, we packed a small linen bag with young ground elder leaves. You see, ever since buying the book on the culinary use of wild herbs & weeds few months ago, I've been discovering new edible wild plants galore. Eating dandelion greens is almost conservative now. I've turned dandelion blossoms into dark and sticky syrup, thrown milk thistle leaves into my salads, and yes, eaten enough wild garlic leaves to provide me with vitamins for months, and yes, even made a pie out of ground elder. I can see that not everybody gets excited about stuff like that - even my 87-year old grandmother was a bit suspicious of me collecting these weeds for human consumption. But luckily K. is very supportive, and doesn't mind being fed one 'interesting' dish after another.

Ground elder (Aegopodium podagraria, also known as bishop's weed and goutweed in English, naat in Estonian) has a long history of being used for medicinal purposes, but it was also cultivated as a food crop in the Middle Ages, especially in Russia (and in Siberia in particular - the Russian Saint Seraphim of Sarov is said to have survived three years on eating mainly ground elder while on self-exposed exile in a deep forest), Scandinavia, in Central Europe. Old Finno-Ugric peoples were keen consumers of ground elder, too. According to some sources, old traders wrapped their vegetables into ground elder leaves to keep them fresh looking and smelling - the leaves are high in essential oils and helped to keep the other produce fresh and aromatic, too. Young and tender ground elder leaves can be added to soups, omelettes and stews. Blanched leaves can be mixed with cottage cheese and curd cheese. The leaves are high on Vitamin E, as well as vitamin C, they're rich in antioxidants, minerals, flavonoids and fibre. Dishes containing ground elder are easily digestible, and have cleansing properties - so they're good for that spring-time detoxing :)


A hortapita in Portaria, June 2006

I decided to make hortapita with my ground elder leaves. The wise Greek village women, you see, have been using wild greens - horta - for culinary purposes forever. I enjoyed hortapita in a shady cafe in Portaria (see the photo above) during my 2006 trip to Greece. Its slightly more elegant and modern version - spanakopita - is one of my favourite pies. Using my ground elder bounty for a Greek hortapita seemed like the most logical thing to do. The Greek villagers would use lots of other wild and bitter leaves for making hortopita (and other dishes too, obviously, like salads etc). Amaranth (vlita in Greek, one of the most popular horta's - rebashein), sow thistle (tsochos / piimaohakas), stinging nettles (tsouknithes / kõrvenõges), mallow (molocha / kassinaeris), dandelion, purslane ( glistrida or andrakles / portulak), wild carrots, as well as more familiar chicory, sorrel, mustard greens, rocket, endives and others. Ground elder makes as good a pie filling as any of the others mentioned - just a little bit bitter, gutsy and earthy.

The pastry recipe is from my friend Virve, who uses it to make a fabulously easy apple pie. It's the easiest pastry to work with and it tastes wonderful - it's easy, soft and pliable dough that procudes a flaky and wonderful pastry. The filling is inspired by my spanakopita recipe.

Hortapita or a Greek-style pie with wild greens
(Naadipirukas)
Serves 8




Pastry:
200 grams butter
200 grams sour cream
350 grams plain flour
a pinch of salt

Filling:
3 Tbsp oil
200-300 grams young ground elder leaves
100 grams onion, finely chopped
200 grams cottage cheese or feta cheese
1 egg
1 Tbsp dried oregano
salt and coarsely ground black pepper

First, prepare the pastry. Melt the butter on a medium heat, take off the heat and cool a little. Mix in sour cream, flour and salt. Knead until the pastry comes together - it'll be very soft and pliable, like plastiline. Wrap into cling film and put into the fridge for up to 30 minutes (leave it for much longer, and you'll have hard time rolling it!)
Meanwhile, prepare the filling. Wash the wild greens, dry thoroughly. Heat a non-stick frying pan and 'cook' the leaves until they 'wilt'. Then quickly rinse them under cold running water to stop them from cooking further. Press until dry, and chop the cooked leaves coarsely.
Heat the non-stick frying pan again, this time with oil on it. Add the onion and cook on a low heat for about 10 minutes, until onion starts to soften. Take off the heat.
Now add the other ingredients, mix thoroughly.
Roll the relaxed dough to a large rectangle about 4-5 mm thick, cut into 2 more or less equally sized rectangles. Place the smaller one on a medium-sized oven tray, spread the filling on top, and cover with the larger dough sheet. Pinch the edges firmly together, pierce with a fork couple of times and brush with whisked egg.
Bake at 200C for 25-30 minutes, until golden brown. Cool a little and cut into squares.

WHB: This is also my entry to the Weekend Herb Blogging, this time hosted by Kalyn herself.



UPDATE 11.6.2007: Read Kalyn's roundup of the 85th WHB - so many great new herbs & plants to check out! Kalyn also mentioned this post over at BLOGHER: Free Food: Eat Your Weeds - thank you!

BLAST FROM THE PAST
A year ago I posted a recipe for savoury muffins with sun-dried tomatoes and feta cheese. Two years ago I was still only contemplating blogging, so no posts there :)