Sue's spinach bread

Yield: 1 Servings

Measure Ingredient
1 pounds Fresh spinach
6 \N Cloves fresh garlic (or more!) (up to 8)
6 \N (or more!) small, dried chiles, such as piquins or African Devils (up to 8)
2 \N Loaves (8-oz) \"frenchettes\", or 1 1-lb loaf french bread
\N \N Olive oil
\N \N Butter (optional)
\N \N Salt (optional)
12 ounces Chunk mozzarella cheese

This is so easy, it hardly needs writing up. All my friends love this, so I thought I'd pass it along. Please excuse the lack of "exact" measurements, but I cook by intuition and guesswork. Feel free to improvise! Thoroughly wash spinach; drain as thoroughly as possible. Tear the larger leaves into smaller pieces.

Mince garlic.

Heat olive oil in large skillet or wok and add garlic. Saute for a few minutes and add spinach. Saute until spinach is limp. Crumble chiles into spinach. If there is a lot of water in the pan from the spinach, you may want to remove spinach to a dish, reduce the liquid on high heat, and then return spinach to the pan. Be careful not to overcook spinach.

Slice frenchettes lengthwise. If using a whole french bread, slice loaf in half, and slice halves lengthwise. Butter and lightly salt halves (this is optional).

Slice mozzarella cheese (I prefer slicing a chunk of cheese over using packaged shredded cheese).

Place bread onto pizza pan or cookie sheet. Spread spinach onto bread. Top with sliced cheese. Bake at 300 - 325 for about 15 - 20 minutes, or until cheese is gooey and bread is crispy. Do not let cheese burn.

Remove from oven and slice into 2 inch pieces. Makes about 24 pieces, and serves 8 - 12 as an appetizer.

The variations here are endless: add mushrooms or capers or a few anchovies or sliced black or green olives to the spinach; use diced fresh chiles instead of dried (habs are great if your guests are into it!); try feta or provolone with or instead of mozzarella, etc, etc.

I would be interested in hearing from anyone who tried this or tried their own variation. I bet Popeye never thought of adding chiles to his spinach! Posted to CHILE-HEADS DIGEST V3 #266 by Buffalo Sue <bflosue@...> on Mar 16, 1997

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