Spinach Feta Flower Bites

Hello everyone. I just wanted to take some time to introduce myself as this is my very first post. My name is Parychehr, aka Chehr. I'm a mother and grandmother who has devoted her life to her family and included her passion for food and design in her lifestyle at home. Now, I've decided to share with you my personal recipes, food ideas and my variation in those I've learned over the years or will learn in the future. I hope you will enjoy these recipes and posts as much as I enjoy making them. 

For this first post I've made my Spinach Feta Flower Bites. It looks beautiful, tastes great and is easy to make. This is definitely a winner as an appetizer in small or big gatherings. 

Ingredients:

• Phyllo Dough - You will need about 8 layers of Phyllo dough to make 24
• Spinach - 1 pack of frozen spinach / 1 cup cooked spinach
• Feta Cheese or goat cheese - 1 cup * (add more or less based on your taste)
• Egg Yolk - 1
• Sesame Seeds 
• Oil 
• Black Pepper - To taste 
• Salt - To taste *(I personally don't add salt because of the saltiness of the cheese)

What You'll Need:

• A flat work surface 
• Mini Muffin Pan

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees and Oil the mini muffin pan.
• Prepare your spinach. If you are using a frozen pack of spinach, follow the instructions on the package. If you are cooking your own spinach, make sure you have a full cup of cooked spinach (as spinach tends to shrink once cooked) and make sure you drain the water completely. 
• Mix together the spinach, the cheese and the pepper. 
• Take about 2 to 3 layers of the phyllo dough at a time as they tend to dry fast. Cut them into square pieces - about 4 ½" by 4 ½" - 
• Once you have the square pieces, take 4 pieces at a time and oil in between them so they sit together. 
• Take the 4 pieces over one of the mini muffin cups and push the middle in with your fingers so the edges are sticking out from the sides...

• Fill the muffin cup with 1 tbsp of the spinach-feta filling.
• Using your fingers to close up the dough over the filling. This should create a flower.
• Continue filling each muffin cup on the pan with 4 squared layers of phyllo doughs and fillings and closing each one. 

• Once you've filled all the pan, beat the egg yolk with two drops of water and brush it onto the top of each flower. 
• Sprinkle sesame seeds onto each flowers.
• Place the pan into the oven for 20-25 minutes until the tops are golden brown. (Be sure to check up on them regularly to avoid burning)

• Once ready and golden, take them out of the oven.
• Allow some cooling time in the pan before transferring them onto a cooling rack.
• Once they've cooled off, serve and enjoy.
• You can refrigerate them unto two days, and they still taste great.

I hope you enjoy this recipe. My daughter helped me make this (as seen in the pictures above). She's the one who encouraged me to start sharing my food in blog form and I'm very excited to start this new journey. She has a style and fashion blog of her own, so be sure to give it a look if you love fashion at www.soundofsweetlullabies.com

And be sure to let me know if you ever try making these, your opinion and how/if you would change it.

Love,

Chehr xx