Estragon Pie
Estragon pie is another dish from the family of khachapuri and lobiani. This one is filled with a mixture of greens: tarragon, coriander (cilantro) and spring onion. This dish is especially popular in the mountain regions of Georgia.
For preparing this dish, you can use the same dough as for lobiani, or you can prepare flaky dough as described below. It needs a little bit more work, but you get a different pastry in the end (of course it can be used for khachapuri and lobiani as well.
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Preparation time: 2 hours
Difficulty level: Medium
Servings: 10
Ingredients
Preparation
Dough:
1 Kg (2 lbs 3 oz) white flour
1 egg
180g (6 oz) butter
500 ml tepid water or milk
1 tsp of salt.
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Filling:
200g (7 oz) fresh tarragon leaves 100g (3 1/2 oz) coriander (cilantro) 150g (5 oz) spring onion
5 eggs
3 tbsps. vegetable oil
3 tbsps. butter
salt
black pepper
In a bowl put the flour with water/milk, egg and salt. Mix the ingredients until you have a soft dough.
Sprinkle flour on a work surface and roll out the dough to make a rectangle of 20 x 40cm (8" x 16")
Spread 1/4 of the butter on half of the dough surface and fold the other half over.
Roll out again and repeat the process four times until all the butter has been applied.
Finally fold the dough over until it fits on a big plate, cover with plastic wrap and put in the fridge for 1 hour.
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Hard-boil the eggs.
Chop the greens.
In a frying pan heat the oil on a medium heat. Add the butter and let it melt, then add the greens.
Fry for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, then remove from the heat and put in a mixing bowl. Peel and chop the eggs and mix with the greens. Add pepper and salt to taste, mix and let cool down.
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Preheat the oven to 150°C (300°F).
Divide the pastry into 5 parts and shape them as balls. Roll out each ball into a round of 25 cm (10").
Place fifth of the filling into the center of the round, then fold and stretch the edges up to meet at the center. Pleat and pinch the dough to create a tidy center knot. Press the bundle down gently and carefully roll it down to an even, 10 cm (7") disk. Pop any pockets of trapped air and cover with the towel. Repeat with the remaining dough balls.
Bake for 20-25 minutes until the pastry is golden brown.
Serve hot.