Authentic Homemade Fatayer (Spinach and Cheese)

Fatayer are classic middle eastern savoury pastries that are stuffed with either spinach, cheese, or meat. Fatayer are a staple and often served for breakfast or as a snack with tea. This recipe is so easy to make with an easy homemade dough.

What are Fatayer?

Fatayer are savoury pies, typically stuffed with either a meat filling, spinach, or cheese. The meat filling resembles that of Lahm Bi Ajeen but its shaped into small hand pies. This recipe is for the spinach and cheese, and they're both really easy to make. You may also know of a related dish called Manakish, which are also savoury pies but are presented in a flat shape similar to a pizza.

The spinach fatayer, also known as fatayer bi sabanekh in Arabic, are really tangy and flavourful with a wonderful depth from the caramelized onions. The cheese ones, which are known as fatayer bi jibneh, have a delicious mixture of creaminess, stretchy-ness and the flavour from the nigella seeds makes them extra special!

Fatayer are typically served at breakfast, or as part of an appetizer spread, or a light dinner with a cup of tea. They are so delicious, and a great snack for kids too. I typically make a big batch of both types and freeze them. They're handy to just pull out whenever I need them.

To make them you need a homemade dough, similar to a pizza dough. Although it may seem intimidating to make dough from scratch, it's easy if you use the steps in this recipe! But if you're not up for it, feel free to use store bought pizza dough or even puff pastry.

Ingredients you'll need for cheese and spinach fatayer

For the homemade dough, you'll need the usual suspects: all-purpose flour, sugar, instant yeast, water, olive oil and salt. This dough will make roughly 16-18 fatayer and you can make them all cheese or all spinach or a mix.

For the spinach filling, I use frozen spinach because I usually have it in my freezer but you're welcome to use fresh spinach as well (follow the recipe card notes for preparation, but generally you would need 2.5x the amount of frozen spinach). You'll also need onions, sumac, a squeeze of lemon, salt and pepper.

For the cheese filling, you need feta cheese, mozzarella cheese, parsley and nigella seeds, which are optional but a favourite of mine! You can add dried mint instead of the nigella seeds if you prefer.

How to make fatayer, step by step

First, decide which fatayer filling you'd like to make. This recipe gives you the filling quantities enough for 1 batch of dough, so if you want to do a mix of cheese and spinach, make sure you halve each of those filling ingredients.

If you're making the spinach filling, take your frozen spinach out of the freezer to thaw. If you're making it last minute, feel free to thaw it in the microwave in 30 second increments.

Making the fatayer dough

To make the dough, which is based on the 10 minute dough I use in my honeycomb bread, start by mixing together the warm water and yeast, mix until well dissolved and set aside for 5 minutes. Next, mix together 1 cup of the flour, the sugar, and the water and yeast mixture. Using a spoon, stir it around until its all well combined. Cover and set aside for 10 minutes.

After 10 minutes, add the remaining flour, the salt, and the olive oil. Mix with your spoon until the dough starts coming together, then place it on a floured surface and knead it for 5-7 minutes until smooth. If you find that it is sticky, feel free to add another 1-2 tablespoons of flour on top as you knead.

You can also do this process in a stand up mixer with a dough hook attached. Simply follow the exact same steps but instead of kneading by hand, allow the dough hook to knead it until smooth.

Place it back in an oiled bowl and cover the dough to allow it to rise for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

Once the dough has doubled in size, punch it down and shape it into equal sized dough balls. I do this by measuring out the dough to roughly 40g for each ball using a kitchen scale (this is optional if you want them all to look even!).

Once shaped into balls, set them aside covered with a towel to proof one last time for roughly 10-15 minutes. This will make the dough really easy to work with and easy to shape.

How to make spinach fatayer (or fatayer bi sabanekh)

To make the spinach filling, start by dicing the onions finely and cook them on medium heat for 5-7 minutes until soft and translucent. Next, its time to get rid of as much moisture as you can from the spinach since it retains so much water. This step is really important to avoid a watery filling that will impact the dough and make the fatayer open up in the oven.

You can also use fresh spinach here, and to prepare it, chop it up and sprinkle a bit of salt on top and leave it for 10 minutes. This will draw out its liquids, then you can squeeze it all out. Remember though that using fresh spinach means you will need 2.5x the quantity specified in the recipe for frozen spinach.

To do this, place the thawed spinach in a sieve and press down using a spoon to release the moisture into a bowl. You can also squeeze it by hand. Do this as much as you can, then place the spinach in the skillet once the onions are cooked.

To the skillet, add the sumac, salt and pepper. Cooking the spinach in the skillet with the onions for 5-7 minutes will further evaporate any moisture left over in the spinach as well as help the flavours to blend together. Taste and adjust the filling - I usually like to add a squeeze of lemon at the end to make it extra tangy and tart.

Once the filling has cooled down, now its time to shape the fatayer! Start by taking one of the dough balls and spreading it out to a thin circle on a floured surface. Ensure you spread it out to a thin layer to avoid a thick dough and an uneven filling to dough ratio.

How to fold fatayer

Place about 1.5 tablespoons of the filling in the middle of the circle, then bring up two sides of the circle to meet at the top, slightly off centre (check the photos below!). Pinch the dough together to close off. Next, bring up the other side to form a triangle, and pinch all sides really well to ensure it is secure.

How to make cheese fatayer

Making the cheese filling is really easy, just grate up the mozzarella and crumble the feta, then mix them with the nigella seeds and finely chopped parsley. Another filling option here is to replace the nigella seeds with mint.

To shape the cheese fatayer, roll out the dough balls into long ovals. Ensure that you roll them out to a thin layer. Then, add roughly 1.5 tablespoons of the filling to the middle and shape it to cover the length of the dough, leaving the edges empty. You can press down on the filling to make it stay in place.

Next, fold over the edges of the oval to form a "boat" looking shape, and pinch the two ends to secure them in place. Pick up the fatayer using the two pinched ends and place on a floured sheet pan. And repeat!

Baking the Fatayer

Preheat the oven to 375F. Arrange the fatayer on a sheet pan that is lightly floured. If you want a shiny finish, you can brush them with an egg, but this is optional and I don't do it.

Place the sheet pan in the oven on the bottom rack for roughly 10-15 minutes, until you check the bottom and it is golden brown. Then move the pan up to the middle rack and switch the oven to broil for 1-2 minutes, but stay right beside it. Once the top of the fatayer turn a light gold, remove them from the oven.

As you're baking in batches, ensure you place the baked fatayer in a platter or tray and cover them with a towel to ensure they don't dry out and stay nice and soft. And that's it - you're ready to serve!

Watch me make them!

FAQs and Tips for Fatayer

Q: How do you eat fatayer? You can serve fatayer for breakfast alongside fresh cut vegetables and a hot cup of tea. They also make a great snack at any time of the day, or a delicious light dinner.

Q: Can you freeze fatayer? Yes, absolutely! They are perfect for freezing. Simply bake the fatayer and allow them to cool, then place them in a freezer bag and freeze for as long as a month.

Q: Can you freeze the fatayer filling? Yes, you can freeze the filling, but I wouldn't recommend it because it would add moisture. I recommend you make the filling as early as 1-2 days in advance and refrigerate if you want to save time.

How to store and re-heat fatayer

I have a few tips for you here. Firstly, after baking, make sure you cover them with a towel to keep them soft. Then, if you've made a large batch, remove the amount that you will eat over the next 1-2 days and freeze the rest.

Freeze them by placing them into freezer bags and laying them flat in one layer. When you'd like to have them, remove them from the freezer and heat them in the oven on a sheet pan at 375F until warm. I don't suggest using the microwave because it'll change the texture of the dough and make it more chewy.

For the fatayer that you want to eat over a few days, place any leftovers in an air tight container and into the fridge. You can also re-heat them in the oven to serve.

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