Yesterday it was our Wedding Anniversary (28 years!!!) and we had a little family celebration, so I prepared this for dessert.
Galatopita, which means milk pie, is a very plain pudding which used to be made with simple, every day ingredients they used to have at home. Flour and water to make the phyllo (I used store bought), milk, eggs and semolina to make the cream and butter. It is similar to galaktompoureko but no phyllo is inserted on the top. Its plainness is what makes it so good. Vanilla flavour is optional and was added much later on. Don’t worry about measuring with a glass. Use a normal glass you drink water in and use the same glass to measure all the other ingredients.
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Baking time: 40 minutes
Yields: about 20 pieces
Ingredients
- 8 phyllo sheets
- 6 glasses of milk
- ½ glass of sugar
- 100 grams of butter
- 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
- 1 3/4 glasses of semolina
- 5 extra large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For syrup
- 1 glass of sugar
- 1 ½ glasses of water
- 5 cloves
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 1 lemon peel
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 180C.
2. Butter a 25 X 30 cm baking pan and start laying your phyllo sheets, each time buttering the sheets. Each time you add a phyllo place it in the opposite directions.
3. In a large pot, add milk, with 1/2 glass of sugar, semolina, lemon zest and vanilla essence and keep whisking until the cream becomes thick. Remove from the heat.
4. Once thick, remove from heat and cool for 5 minutes.
5. Quickly whisk in three of the eggs and keep whisking to incorporate them without curdling them.
6. Pour into prepared pan and each phyllo, which is outside the tin fold on top of the cream, brushing with some butter.
7. Whisk the remaining two eggs with 2 spoonfuls of sugar and pour over cream and with the brush make sure that the egg covers the entire surface. Bake for approximately 30-40 minutes, or until top of becomes golden-brown.
8. As soon as you put the pie in the oven prepare the syrup.
9. Add sugar, water, lemon peel, cloves and cinnamon stick and bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes and remove from heat. When the pie is ready discard lemon peel, cinnamon and cloves and pour the syrup with a spoon, making sure that it will wet the entire surface. Add little by little allowing it to absorb and then add more.
See printable recipe here.
I am submitting this recipe to the Sweet Pies Event I am hosting but as I also love baking, I am submitting this to my friend Ben, of What’s Cooking, for his event I love Baking.
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Tags: Greek, made with phyllo, pies
October 13th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
Sounds just divine..And happy wedding Anniversary Ivy!!
October 13th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Thank you Divya for your wishes.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:34 pm
Wow 28 years.
Happy Anniversary and many more of years of happy marriage.
I have been comming across lot of new recipes after comming to your blog.
October 13th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
Thank you very much Happy Cook. I hope you like the new recipes you see.
October 13th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Congratulations darling!!!!! Hey I love celebrations and 28 is a fantastic number. Hope that there be many more to come
:D 
I just baked my first sweet pie and it will be for you♥. I’ll tell you how it turned out soon
October 13th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Thank you Nuria both for your wishes and for baking a pie for the event. I can’t wait to see see what you’ve made
October 13th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Happy anniversary to you and yours, dear Ivy. May you have many, many more.
The pie looks lovely.
October 13th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
28 years! Wow Ivy… Congratulations! Wish you both many more happy years ahead.
October 13th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Thank you very much Sunita, I remember yours’ was a few days ago as well. I wish you the same as well.
Anudivya, thanks very much. The years pass so quickly, I can’t believe that 28 years have passed. I think it is only yesterday that we got married but my son will be 26 next month, so I can’t hide it.
October 13th, 2008 at 10:43 pm
Twenty eight years…congratulations to the both of you sis:D Time flies by so quickly and things are still going strong!! This dessert is perfect for the celebration as well as foryour event. I have tried this pie on several occasions including when I was in Athens:D
October 13th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Thanks sis for your wishes. Time does fly quickly, doesn’t it?
October 13th, 2008 at 11:16 pm
Congratulations on your 28 year anniversary Ivy. Galatopita is so delicious and I agree with you that its “plainess” is wat makes it unique.
October 13th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
Thank you Peter for your wishes and like most Greek dishes this is also a very simple recipe.
October 13th, 2008 at 11:23 pm
Happy Anniversary Ivy! I hope you had a wonderful day yesterday. Your galatopita looks delicious–I’ve never made galatopita but I think I will try very soon.
October 13th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Thanks Maria. Had a lovely time with the family during lunch but I was also working in the afternoon till late in the evening but that was my fault as I had arranged this a very long time ago and did not remember that it was our anniversary.
October 14th, 2008 at 12:02 am
Ivy, “na zhsetai”, “hgeia” and Happy Anniversary.
The galotopita looks fabulous…best one I’ve seen yet!
October 14th, 2008 at 12:22 am
Congrats on your anniversary! This dessert looks so tasty.
October 14th, 2008 at 12:36 am
Oh, yummy! That Galatopita looks really good! I really have to make this pie soon as I’ve been meaning to test that recipe since long..
Cheers,
Rosa
October 14th, 2008 at 12:59 am
28 years! I couldn’t be happier for you both! I hope you day was beautiful.
October 14th, 2008 at 1:12 am
Happy anniversary, wishing both of you happiness and many many years to come. This dessert seems delicious.
October 14th, 2008 at 1:44 am
Happy anniversary to you and your husband, Ivy! I have only had galakotoboureko but this looks really delicious. I love your glass measurements - that is exactly how my yiayias make everything
October 14th, 2008 at 3:53 am
Happy Anniversary! We just celebrated 7 years in June so you are our “senpai” (Japanese for someone higher up the ladder than you).
That recipe is making me SO hungry!
October 14th, 2008 at 4:10 am
Happy anniversary Ivy. Wow. 28 years! Congratulations.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:44 am
Hi Ivy, happy anniversary. I wish you many more happy and prosperous years.
Take care. Tina
October 14th, 2008 at 9:19 am
Yum Ivy! It looks like a huge custard slice to me - and I love those.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:19 am
PS Happy Anniversary!!
October 14th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
Mmm, I’m quite fond of desserts.
CONGRATS! 28 years is impressive. Your husband should be grateful to have such a nice wife that cooks him lots of yummy food.
October 14th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Wow! 28 years! Hearty Congratulations! And my Best Wishes!
The dish looks delicious!
I’m falling more and more in love with the food of your region. Yummy!
I’m so happy to have found you.
BTW, I’ll be sening you the details for the reipe I ‘m submitting for World Food Day soon. Thank you!
October 14th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Thank you all for your lovely wishes.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Congrats and happy anniversary! This looks like a delicious treat to celebrate
October 14th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
Dear Ivy, Congratulations and my very best on your Anniversary! What a lovely treat to celebrate a great day
Rosie x
October 14th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Dear Ivy
Congratulations on your wedding anniversary!! I hope you had a wonderful day filled with lots of love and happiness.
This milk pie looks so yummy!!!
Maria
x
October 14th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
Na zisete! I love galatopita and this one looks fab, I wish I had a..few pieces:)
October 14th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
Hey guys, thanks a lot for your wishes.
October 15th, 2008 at 12:26 am
Happy Anniversary Ivy! What a delightful pie to serve to celebrate.
October 15th, 2008 at 2:30 am
Ivy, what an incredibly delicious pie. I love this. Congratulations on your anniversary. My hubby and I are celebrating our 20th year together this month as well. Thank you for stopping by my site. I always love hearing from you. May you have many more years of love, health and happiness.
October 15th, 2008 at 9:53 am
Happy anniversary Ivy! Here’s to many more
I love custardy pies so this is right up my alley. Thank you so much for the recipe. I want to participate but suddenly my pineapple pie seems like the poor cousin. Sigh. Let me see what else I can come up with instead.
October 15th, 2008 at 10:41 am
Happy anniversary to you and your husband! I’ve never seen something similar to galatopita and I love how semolina it’s used to make the filling (very clever indeed)
October 16th, 2008 at 6:38 am
Happy belated Anniversary my friend. I will enter my sweet apple pie this weekend after my contest.
October 19th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
As you can see I am very late here,Ivy but please accept my hearfelt wishes to you both on your anniversary.
And your pie looks nlike the perfect dessert to end the day.
October 19th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Thank you everybody for your wishes and thank you Aparna as well. It’s not easy to follow up all these blogs and posts. Sometimes I miss a lot of posts as well due to lack of time, so I think we all understand.
November 9th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
A different version of Galatopita from my own, but I am sure it was tasty! Looks great.
November 9th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Woops! I forgot to wish you a (belated) Happy Anniversary!!!