August 6, 2006

Zucchini Custard Pie

Description:
Last night I sat back after dinner and thought, "Dang, that was good. I rock."

Yes. Dinner was that good.

I was inspired by a feta zucchini tart that was in a recent issue of Saveur Magazine. But I didn't have all of the ingredients they listed (nor did I want to go through all the work that the recipe seemed to require) so I made up my own recipe.

Behold:

Ingredients:
phillo dough (i use an organic brand that's at the store, but what i'd really like to find some day is a whole wheat brand.)
butter. lots.
zucchini (i used 2 medium sized zucs but i probably should have used at least one more if not 2 more.)
1 diced onion
1 close garlic
salt and pepper to taste
5 or 6 eggs (or more. if i had added more zucchini i probably would have used more eggs. i think i used 5 eggs this time around.)
2 cups milk or cream (i used whole milk and that worked well.)
fresh basil

Directions:
Saute onion in a bit of butter. When the onions are almost translucent, toss in the zucchini. I had Naomi use the side of the grater (that makes slices) to cut the zucchini up. I cooked the zuc on low heat with a lid so that it steamed as well. I tossed the garlic in near the end. (I used our new little, itty, bitty garlic grater on the garlic. It worked really well.) Add salt and pepper to taste.

Coat bottom and sides of a brownie pan (I used a glass 13 x 9 pan.) with melted butter. Alternate layers of phillo dough and more butter. (I don't put butter between every single layer. But when I do put it on, I'm fairly liberal. Add as much or as little butter as you want. It's your waist line.) Make this layer as thick as you want. I probably used 10 - 12 layers of dough.

Chop up some feta. (Use as much or as little as you like. I didn't put any on the kids side but when they tried it with feta they liked it so next time the feta goes on the whole thing.)

Spread the feta out on top of the phillo dough. Then spread the zuc/onion/garlic mixture on top of that.

Beat the eggs and milk (and more salt and pepper if you'd like) and pour over the whole deal.

Wash and tear up a bunch of basil leaves (the more the merrier) and sprinkle over the top. I didn't add tomatoes but I think several tomato slices along the top would have been a great addition. (I just didn't have any on hand.)

Cook at 350 degrees F until the center is set. (It shouldn't jiggle or slide around.) A lightly browned top would be nice, though I don't think I let mine cook quite that long. We were too hungry to wait.

20 comments:

  1. Why dont you make your own filo pastry???

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  2. I know this has nothing to do with recipies and such, but I like the new look on your site and that headshot, well it turns heads. hehehe

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  3. mmm...sounds really yummy.

    btw, after your last review of saveur, we subscribed and are lovin' it!!

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  4. woo hoo!! i'm glad you're enjoying saveur, T.

    thanks, danny. i'm really liking it too. my home page feels more homey to me now.

    barbs, do you make your own philo dough?!!!! isn't that a ton of work? do you use a pasta roller or something?

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  5. a local health food store here has whole wheat phillio...it's good:-)

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  6. is this good with cool whip? i dont see any sugar in this pie.

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  7. ew!

    trust me. this dish is heavenly without any sugar. (between the gobs of butter, the sweetness of the phillo dough and the sweetness of the sauteed onioins, it's a fairly sweet form of savory.) :-)

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  8. I think you are talking about a different pastry than I am thinking of cause filo pastry isnt sweet.

    No I don't make my own, it's just that you said you wished you could get a whole wheat brand. I would have thought because you have posted that you made your own flour that perhaps you made your own filo.

    Because of my weight and heart problems I use water between filo sheets instead of butter. Or sometimes I just give it a light spray of vegetable oils...

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  9. what i'm thinking of is very very thin sheets of dough (which is why i would think it would be hard to make. i'm not sure how i'd get it that thin.). it's sweet because it's made from wheat (processed wheat, at that, which is always sweater than whole wheat).

    it's the same kind of sweet that you get from a cracker (and i don't mean your cookie kinda crackers, either. ) when you chew it awhile and the carbs break down into sugars.

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  10. Have you tried a smear of yoghurt?

    A mix of olive oil and yoghurt works well, too.

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  11. there isn't one. it's made locally, by one of those farm places. it just has a sticker that says 'whole wheat phillio'

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  12. Yep Meg it's the same thing, we call it Filo Pastry, you call it Phillo Dough..hehe..your taste buds must be more fine tuned than mine because it sure doen't taste sweet to me..our "crackers" are all salty hehe..

    Never tried yoghurt, sounds good tho. I have used olive oil a couple of times and yep that works well too.

    I have some Filo pastry in the freezer and am going to be making some chicken spring rolls sometime this week. I don't deep fry so I cook then in the oven...mmm yummy hehe

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  13. www.fillofactory.com
    we make organic, organic whole wheat, and organic spelt fillo doughs

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  14. That's exactly the kind I use!

    But Vitamin Cottage (ours, at least) doesn't generally (if ever) carry the whole wheat version. :-(

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  15. Hello Meg, this looks delicious! I have some phillo pastry left over. I might try your zucchini custard pie tonight. TFS!

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