Unlike last week’s time consuming recipe, the following recipe requires very little effort or ingredients.
The original bake, which is known in the Sephardic cuisine as “Makarron reynado”, is a simple mix of cooked spaghetti, Feta cheese, eggs and milk, baked until set and golden.
While many other baked pasta dishes use thick Béchamel sauce in the mixture, this bake is much lighter, and has a fresh tangy flavor, from the Feta cheese.
The baked dish is then cut into squares, and served hot, or at room temperature, as part of a weekend brunch buffet, as a light lunch, with fresh salad on the side, or as a side dish.
Though I most often prefer the basic recipe, different additions and flavors can be added to it, as you can see from the following suggestions. Try them, or create your own version, and enjoy.
Notes:
* Bulgarian Feta cheese has tangier flavor and creamier texture, than the Greek Feta. It is the preferred cheese for this bake, but if you can’t find it, any other Feta cheese will do.
* If you can find it, Quark cheese (see THIS post for explanation), can be used instead of the sour cream or yogurt.
Makes: 8-10
Prep time: 15 minutes
Baking time: 50 minutes
Ingredients:
1 package thin spaghetti (1 Lb, 454 grams)
2 Tbs butter, soft
1 cup whole milk, at room temperature
3 XL eggs, beaten
1 cup sour cream, or thick full fat yogurt (see notes)
2 tsp salt
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 cup crumbled sheep Feta cheese (preferably Bulgarian, see notes)
Olive oil
1. Preheat oven to 390F (200C). Line a 12”x8” (20.5 cm x 30 cm) baking pan with baking paper.
2. Cook the spaghetti al-dente, according to the directions on the box. Drain and place in a large bowl.
3. While the pasta is still warm, add the butter and milk, and mix well, to melt the butter. Add the eggs, sour cream or yogurt, salt and pepper, and mix again. Add the Feta cheese, and mix gently, to keep fairly large chunks of it in the mixture.
4. Transfer the mixture into the prepared pan. Flatten the top with a spatula and drizzle a bit of olive oil on top. Cover the pan with baking paper and aluminum foil.
5. Bake for about 50 minutes, removing the cover after 30 minutes, until the bake is set and golden.
Variations:
Roasted red peppers:
To the basic mixture, add ½ cup chopped roasted red peppers (click HERE for instructions on how to prepare at home, or use drained from a jar) and 1 Tbs crumbled fresh thyme.
Sun dried tomatoes and olives:
To the basic mixture, add 1/3 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes, 10 salt cured chopped pitted black olives, and 1 Tbs crumbled fresh thyme.
This looks super delicious! I do something like this routinely, only not baked. This uses up small bits of leftovers with (usually) fresh pasta (any shape). NOLA Boy is drooling over the Feta as we speak, so guess I will try giving it a quick bake in the Cuisinart Oven Central before serving to get that crispy top.
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Thank you Judie, I’m glad you liked the dish. It is indeed a great way to use leftover cooked pasta and cheese. I suspect this is how the recipe was originally created. Feta cheese adds such great tangy flavor. I hope you’ll enjoy it. 🙂
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This looks awesome. The perfect soul food in these days…
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Thank you Karin, I’m glad you liked the dish. We need such comfort foods now! 🙂
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Wow, this is a new recipe to me and one that I am going to make. Thanks for offering the detailed instructions about how to use the baking paper and foil.
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Thank you Bob, I’m glad you liked the dish. It’s one of my favorites, and so easy to assemble. I hope you’ll enjoy it.
As for aluminum foil, I prefer that it won’t touch the food directly, so using it along with baking paper works well for me. 🙂
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Right…I figured that was what your were doing with the paper/foil combo.
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I will have to try this one!
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Thank you Aletta, I’m glad to know. Hope you’ll enjoy this tasty dish. 🙂
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I am sure we will! 😀
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I’ve been wanting to make a “spaghetti pie” – I think it was David Lebovitz recipe. Your version sounds great and I will have to go to a specialty cheese shop to get that Bulgarian feta – sounds wonderful 🙂
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Thank you Judi, I’m glad you liked the recipe. Lebovitz’s recipe, which I’ve just checked, looks great, but the cheeses he uses are much heavier than feta.
Bulgarian feta is my favorite, but any other type will work just as well. This recipe is very adoptable. 🙂
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Will be delighted to try this simple but no doubt tasty bake when I an get a supermarket on-line delivery again ! No longer possible here in the country . . . but certain complete food services still deliver a whole week’s meals . . . in my case too costly but with quite interesting choices . . . in country Australia we may feel safer from death and destruction, but coming atop six months of bushfire tragedies we do hurt . . . thank you for a recipe-for-the-morrow tho’ 🙂 1
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Thank you Eha, I’m glad you liked the recipe.
Unfortunately, times are indeed quite chaotic here as well. Hopefully Australia will not get hit too badly, as you said, you’ve had enough with the devastation of fires!
Hope things will improve soon for all. 🙂
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Simple but the variations look very yum. We can develop as we like!
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Thank you, I’m glad you liked the dish. It is indeed very versatile and it’s fun to come up with new versions for it. 🙂
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I really like all kind of pasta bake – your recipe will be my next one!!!
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Thank you Felix, I’m glad to hear. I hope you’ll enjoy this tasty bake. 🙂
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Ronit, this reminds me very much of a frittata that I make with leftover spaghetti. When I have access to some of those ingredients, I will definitely be giving it a try.
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Thank you Karen, I’m glad you liked the dish. One can go wrong with pasta and cheese!
I also make the type of frittata you’ve mentioned, whenever I have some leftover pasta. This recipe is easier to handle, when preparing a larger quantity. 🙂
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Oh yum. I could see eating this cold! I love Bulgarian feta. I haven’t had it for years, but there used to be a store where I could buy it in bulk in its brine and I absolutely loved it!
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Thank you Mimi, I’m glad you liked the dish. Eating it cold is one of my guilty pleasures! Bulgarian feta is so tasty. I love how creamy and tangy it is. Hope you can still find it. 🙂
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I can’t, but I’m sure I can order it from somewhere.
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I’ve seen a few websites that sell it online.
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Okay I’ll look!
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This sounds like my friend’s Armenian dish she made for Christmas. It was yummy.
http://www.motownsavvy.com
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Thank you Carla, I’m glad the dish brought back tasty memories. Very interesting to learn! 🙂
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This sounds perfect! I definitely want to try it. Do you think it would work with matza? Passover is coming and I am starting to plan.
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Thank you Carol, this bake was perfect for a weekend brunch. I’m glad you liked it.
I’ve never tried it with matza, but I see no reason why it wouldn’t work. Good luck! 🙂
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I am going to put it in my book. I have been trying to make something dairy for Passover that actually tastes good.
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I posted a recipe for a spinach-potato-cheese bake, that is gluten free and perfect for Passover. If interested, check the link below:
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I bet it would work with cooked diced potatoes too. It is just the texture that would be different.
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No doubt it will be a totally different texture.
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Yeah, It might be too soft. Let me think about this. I really want simple dairy dishes for Passover. It is right around the corner!
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I was thinking: maybe add a crust?
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Definitely an option. You can actually use whole mazta that was quickly dipped in water. It works great.
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That definitely sounds like a good option. Do you think I could put one matza on the bottom and another on the top? I made something like that once. It was something different. I think it was Sephardic too.
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Yes, it is a Sephardic dish.
But the top matzh has to be covered with some of the egg/cheese mixture. Otherwise it’ll get too dry.
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I think I used egg mixture. I haven’t made it in years. I will have to check.
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