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Tahini pies! A big love. Once you enter a Cypriot bakery, you will realise how important pastries are for Cypriots. We’re talking about art, I’m not joking! An absolute nightmare for those who have celiac diseases or gluten intolerance! With incredible choices in sweet and savoury snacks: from syrupy fingers, sweet and savoury flaounes, delicious olive pies. And of course, Tahini pies, the culmination of all these: sweet enough to not make you feel sick, crispy, the roasted tahini overflowing discreetly from each of its sides. If it’s fresh and just out of the oven, it makes you think that croissants and every type of puff pastry are poor choices compared to it. To be honest, I’ve been eating a lot of tahini pies in my life: in Cyprus, you always find some at home, it’s essential, like bread. I’ve had it for breakfast, as an afternoon snack, after a night out and during drinking! Since I started following a healthier diet and started avoiding white flour and sugar, I had to bid farewell to my beloved childhood memories. So, when a friend of Saucha asked me to make a tahini pie, I was thrilled with the idea. Instead of white flour, I used Zea Flour, which has lower gluten content and more magnesium. Note that Zea flour still has some gluten so if you have a celiac disease it’s better to replace with buckwheat flour. I also added chestnut flour, which has a much sweeter flavour than other flours and is suitable for pastry. It gives a very special flavour but if you can’t find it in stores, you can put the whole quantity of Zea. Instead of white sugar, I used coconut sugar for the dough and maple syrup for the filling. The result? Simply amazing! A lighter dose than the normal tahini pie but equally delicious, sweet, and pleasing. I won’t tell you this recipe doesn’t need time. You’re making a dough, so you need to be patient! As they say, good things come to those who wait!
Ingredients for 3 tahini rolls:
– 220 gr of Zea flour
– 100 gr of chestnut flour
¼ cups of coconut sugar or brown sugar
– ¼ tsp salt
– 1 tsp of yeast (you can also use gluten free yeast)
– ¼ tsp machlepi
– ½ spoon of cinnamon
For the filling:
– 200 gr of tahini
– ½ cup of maple syrup
– ¾ spoons of cinnamon
Put all the dough ingredients into a large bowl and mix well. Gradually, add a cup of lukewarm water. Stir well until the dough is ready.
Empty up the counter and roll the dough on it for about 5 minutes until it’s polished.
Put it in an oiled bowl, cover it with a towel and let it inflate at a warm area for about 1 hour.
While you wait, make the filling by mixing the ingredients into a small bowl.
Separate the dough in 3 balls.
On a floured countertop, spread the dough with a rolling pin trying to make an elongated strip (about 30 cm long, 15 cm wide)
Fill the dough with 2 spoons of the filling, 1/3 of its width along the length of the dough, and then fold the dough to cover the filling and make a long roll.
Then, make a “snail” shape with the roll and move it to a platter which has a greaseproof paper on top. If some of the filling is poured, that’s even better because it will give an even more crisp taste to the tahinopita.
Follow the same procedure for the other two rolls.
Bake at 150 degrees Celsius for about 35-40 minutes.