Camembert pies with bacon and spinach

Makes 6

Preparation time 30 minutes Baking time 30 minutes

You need

• 500 g spinach leaves

• 1 tablespoon butter

• 250 g bacon, chopped

• 1 tablespoon flour

• ½ cup milk

• pinch each of salt, pepper and nutmeg

• 400 g puff pastry, thawed

• 1 wheel of camembert, sliced

• 1 egg, beaten

Here’s how

1 Preheat the oven to 200° C. Rinse the spinach and pat dry with a cloth. Cut out the white veins and chop them finely. Tear the green leaves into smaller pieces and set aside.

2 Melt the butter in a pan and fry the bacon until crispy. Remove the bacon from the pan, but retain the fat. Fry the spinach veins until translucent and tender. Add the flour and stir for another minute or 2 until foamy.

3 Beat the milk into the mixture and stir until it thickens. Now add the spinach leaves to the sauce and season to taste with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Steam for a few minutes with the lid on until the spinach has wilted and the sauce is cooked. (It shouldn’t taste like flour!) Remove the pan from the heat and allow the mixture to cool down to room temperature.

4 Use a rolling pin to flatten the puff pastry slightly. Cut the pastry into six equal-sized squares. Grease the cups of a big muffin pan with cooking spray and line each cup with a square of pastry, with the corners sticking out. Scoop a spoonful of the spinach filling in every cup, followed by a few slices of camembert and some bacon. Repeat the layers until all the ingredients are used. Fold the corners of the pastry over the filling. ( The filling doesn’t have to be covered completely.)

5 Brush the pies with the egg and bake at

200˚ C for about 30 minutes or until the pastry is golden brown and cooked through. Let the pies cool down in the pan before you unmould them on a cooling rack.