Today I will share the recipe for the breakfast of the Greek gods with you! I didn’t dare to share it earlier, because I thought it’d make you fat. But there is actually no reason to think so, unless you eat the whole pie at once of course. There is almost no butter in it. What is in it, you will see in a few seconds. Not too much sugar though and if you eat normal portions of it, it won’t make you fat. Bougatsa or galactoboúreko – that’s the easy name for tourists – is something you may not have missed in your life and it’s quite easy to make. I won’t keep it any longer from you!
In Greece we have cosy breakfast cafés, like Θείος Βάνιας (thíos Vánias, uncle Vanjas). There you can get tyropitta’s and a lot more sweet and savoury pies with pastry filled with leek, spinach, minced meat and so on. And coffee of course! But there is also something else that you can get there and that is called bougátsa (μπουγάτσα in Greek). It consists of fyllo pastry that is filled with a sweet cream that is a bit like the cream in a mille-feuille. Before I forget: most of the time we eat it with a cup of cold chocolate milk, but in some parts of Greece coffee seems also to be allowed.
Ingredients for a medium-size oven dish:
1 liter of milk
100 gram of cornflour or corn semolina
4 eggs
175 gram of sugar
8 – 10 pieces of fyllo pastry
50 gram of butter
powdered sugar and cinnamon (powder)
A medium-size oven-dish, preferably square (round is no problem)
Preparation:
Put on the oven at medium temperature (180°C).
You pour 100 ml of the milk in a mug and let the corn semolina or flour dissolve in it. You mix the sugar with the eggs in a bowl until it becomes white and fluffy. Then you add the corn flower mix and you stir or mix it well. You pour the rest of the milk (900 ml) in a pan and boil it. Then you lower the fire and you add the butter with the dough to the milk. You let it boil for 2 – 3 minutes while stirring, until it becomes quite solid like a cream. Take the cream off the fire.
Some really enthusiastic dudes make home-made fyllo pastry. Therefore you need a special rolling pin: a Greek one that you will for sure find in some shop. I myself buy the pastry ready in the supermarket. If you have 10 leaves, you start with three and then a layer cream. Then twice two leaves and again a layer cream and you finish with another three leaves. If you have eight, you take two for every layer. On top of each layer you put a bit butter.
Then the pie goes into the oven, at 180°C for 40 minutes. When it’s ready, you leave it on the counter to cool down for about 10 minutes. Now you can cut it into square pieces of about 10 cm (4 inch) length and width. You sprinkle powdered sugar and cinnamon on top of it (if you don’t like it, then don’t), you cut the bougatsa and eat it with a little fork.
Καλή όρεξη! Kalí órexi – enjoy!
