Vegan Gozleme with Spinach Potato Filling
Combining carbohydrates with carbohydrates – is there anything better? Gözleme are stuffed thin flatbreads. And yes, they are often filled with spinach, feta cheese, onions, or minced meat – but you can also fill them with potatoes, so that’s exactly what we’ll do today, right? If potatoes don’t convince you yet, let me also mention that gözleme are a great dish to prepare ahead, take for lunch at work, or even freeze for later!
The dough is easily prepared and made from flour, dry yeast, water, some oil, sugar, and salt. Unlike fresh yeast, you don’t have to dissolve dry yeast in warm water first. However, if you’re not sure if your dry yeast is still active then it's worth the step. Dissolve dry yeast with sugar in the warm water – if you don’t see any bubbles forming after 10 minutes, you may have to go to the supermarket again to buy new yeast.
If you find that the potato filling is a bit too much for your hunger, use spinach and onions, or bell peppers, eggplant, zucchini or vegan minced meat instead. If you’ve seasoned your filling too mild and think that your gözleme taste blend, combine them with a flavorful (maybe even spicy).
Vegan Gozleme with Spinach Potato Filling
Ingredients
Dough:
- 200 g (1.66 cups) flour
- 0.5 tsp salt
- 0.5 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp dry yeast
- 1 tsp vegetable oil
- 100 ml (0.5 cup) warm water
- 4 tbsp vegan butter (melted)
- vegetable oil for frying
Filling:
- 400 g (14 oz) potatoes
- 1 onion
- 1 garlic clove
- 10 g (0.33 oz) parsley
- 80 g (3 oz) spinach
- 2 tsp pul biber
- salt
- pepper
Instructions
For the dough, mix flour, salt, sugar, and dry yeast in a large bowl. Little by little add warm water and stir to combine. Add the vegetable oil and knead into a smooth dough.
Form a dough ball and transfer it back to the lightly oiled bowl. Let rest and rise at a warm place for approx. 20-30 minutes. You should cover the bowl for this and wait until the dough is almost doubled in volume.
While the dough is rising, prepare the filling. Peel and cook potatoes in plenty of salted water for approx. 15 minutes or until fork-tender. Drain and let the potatoes cool down.
Finely dice cooked potatoes. Peel and finely dice onion and garlic, finely chop parsley. Heat some vegetable oil in a frying pan and fry onion and garlic on low heat for approx. 5 minutes. The onions should be translucent and the garlic shouldn't burn. Add diced potato and keep frying for approx. 3-4 minutes, or until they are browned. Finally, add spinach and keep frying until it wilts. Season the filling with pul biber, salt, and pepper. Add chopped parsley and stir to combine.
Once the dough has risen, half it. Roll out each dough into a large rectangle. Add half of the filling to each dough. Place the filling on the center, but make sure to leave approx. four fingers wide space to the edges. The filling should not pile up. Instead just make one "smooth" layer. Once you're done, fold each side of the dough over the filling to the centre. This way, the dough should overlap and seal the filling completely.
Carefully, press the sealed gozleme to make them a bit thinner. Heat vegetable oil in a nonstick frying pan and fry each gozleme from both sides until golden brown. While doing so, brush each side with melted vegan butter.
Remove gozleme from the pan and brush with melted vegan butter one more time. Cut in pieces and serve warm or cold!
