The Thrifty Cookbook: 476 Ways to Eat Well With Leftovers (39 page)

Spinach
Wash 1kg spinach, then put it in a large saucepan with only the water that clings to its leaves. Cook over a high heat, stirring constantly, for 2-3 minutes, until the leaves have wilted to a mere fraction of their original size. Allow to cool, then squeeze out well and chop finely (if you are using baby leaf spinach, you will not need to chop it). Spread it over the pastry with the feta and then proceed as in the main recipe.

Leftover chicken
Add some cooked chicken, shredded fairly small, to the filling. In this case you could use either courgettes or spinach, or use the same quantity of leeks, sliced finely and cooked in butter until soft.

Leftover lamb
Add some finely chopped or torn leftover lamb to either courgettes or spinach and omit the feta, adding extra parsley and even some chopped tomatoes, if you like.

Swiss chard
Another lovely alternative. Strip the leaves from the thickest part of the stalks and shred them roughly. Slice the stalks separately and cook in a little oil until softened. Stir in the leaves and cook until wilted. Add a handful of toasted pine nuts and the zest of ½ lemon to the filling.

Beef or lamb, rice and feta cheese
To make a small pie for 2, soften a diced onion and a crushed garlic clove in a little butter in a pan, add a chopped large tomato, a tablespoon or so of risotto rice and a couple of teacups of diced cooked beef or lamb. Combine well. Add 2 tablespoons of water or stock, a pinch of ground cinnamon and a grinding of pepper. Cook until the rice is
al dente,
topping up the liquid if necessary. Allow to cool. Spread the mixture into a small pie dish lined with filo pastry. Mix together an egg and a tablespoon of crumbled feta cheese and pour over the meat. Cover with more filo and bake as in the main recipe.

Pizza dough is dead simple to make and pizzas are not something to be scared of. Effectively, they are leftovers on toasted dough, limited only by your imagination or what you have hanging around in the fridge or vegetable basket – and they take only minutes to cook.

The trick is to get the oven as hot as you can and to use a metal or terracotta base that heats really efficiently. A pizza stone is good; a baking tray is fine but works less well; an upturned roasting tin is worth considering too. Though it is clunky, I often make small pizzas by lightly oiling the underneath of a big cast iron casserole, putting it in the oven upside down and getting it really hot, then using the base to cook the dough.

You can make things really simple if you have a bread maker, by using the most basic recipe for white bread and setting the machine on its ‘dough only’ setting. Most Italian pizza cooks swear that adding a bit of dough from a previous batch gives freshly made dough a deeper, nuttier taste, so if you do have some left over, cover it tightly with cling film to seal out any air and keep it in the fridge for up to a week. If you want to keep it for longer, pizza dough freezes well.

Enough for four 25cm pizzas

a double quantity of Quick Tomato Sauce (see
page 36
)

mozzarella and/or grated hard cheese

For the dough:

500g strong white flour

1 sachet (7g) easy-bake yeast

1 teaspoon salt

300ml tepid water

1 tablespoon olive oil

First make the dough. Sift the flour into a bowl, add the yeast and salt and stir to combine.

Make a well in the centre and gradually add the water and oil, stirring until the ingredients come together in a dough that pulls away from the side of the bowl easily; you may need a little more or less water, depending on the absorbency of the flour.

Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface and knead for 5-10 minutes by pushing it away from you with the heel of one hand and pulling the far edge over on top of itself with the other, giving it a quarter turn every now and then.

When the dough feels smooth and springy, shape it into a ball and place in a clean bowl. Cover with a cloth and leave in a warm place for about an hour, until doubled in volume.