Spanakopita

History

Spanakopita is a pie or pastry made from cooked spinach, crumbled feta, onion or leeks and dill, wrapped in thin layered sheets of phyllo pastry brushed with olive oil before baking. Phyllo dough itself, stretched into extremely thin sheets, is a direct legacy of Ottoman and Byzantine cuisine that Greece shares with the entire Levant and Balkan region, where similar layered pies exist under related names.

Spanakopita is made today across Greece either as a large family-sized pie meant to be cut into portions, or as small individual triangular pastries sold as street snacks in bakeries and city kiosks. Every Greek family has its own version, some adding kasseri cheese or eggs to the filling, though the most common version remains simply spinach, feta and fresh dill.

Ingredients — for 6 people

• 1 kg (2.2 lb) fresh spinach, washed and drained
• 250 g (9 oz) crumbled feta
• 2 spring onions or 1 leek, fresh dill
• 250 g (9 oz) phyllo pastry
• Olive oil

Step-by-step Greek spanakopita recipe

1. Sweat the spinach with the onion or leek until it releases all its water, then drain thoroughly.
2. Mix the drained spinach with the crumbled feta and chopped dill.
3. Brush each phyllo sheet with olive oil before layering it over the next, building a base of several layers in an oiled baking dish.
4. Spread the spinach-and-feta filling evenly over the phyllo.
5. Cover with several more oiled phyllo sheets, folding the edges inward.
6. Bake at 180°C (355°F) until the top is deeply golden and crisp, about 40 minutes.

Cooking method

Technique: stacking many oiled phyllo sheets, baked until crisp for a thin, dry layered crust.

Traditional equipment: a large round or rectangular baking dish, a brush for oiling each phyllo sheet.

Benchmarks: always drain the spinach very thoroughly; excess water soaks the phyllo and keeps it from turning crisp.

Nutrition, per serving

Calculated from the raw ingredient quantities above, divided by six servings.

Notable amounts: fiber is high for a savory pastry, at roughly 5 g per serving, almost entirely from the kilogram of spinach used. Saturated fat comes mostly from the feta, with the olive oil brushed between the phyllo sheets contributing more unsaturated fat.

Economic context

Spinach, feta and phyllo are all everyday staples in Greek kitchens, which is why spanakopita appears equally as a large family pie and as a small, cheap triangular snack sold in bakeries and kiosks across the country.

Source: World Bank / FAO, Food Prices for Nutrition database (Cost and Affordability of a Healthy Diet) v4.0, 2024 data, CC BY 4.0, DOI 10.57966/41AN-KY81. Retrieved 29 July 2026. This figure describes the cost of a healthy diet in Greece generally — it is not a costing of this specific recipe.

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