Fried calzones with spinach, without rising, without yeast, milk and eggs: an appetizer and a last-minute dinner lifesaver that you can prepare when you’re in a hurry. Not sure what to make for dinner or have little time? Here’s a suggestion: make calzones without milk and yeast, fried and filled with spinach, mozzarella and speck! Do you remember our pan-fried potato flatbreads and their version with spring onions? These two recipes without rising won you over, but this calzone recipe will literally drive you crazy and I’m sure you’ll make them often, changing the filling as in the classic Cartocciate with ham and mozzarella! For our dough without yeast we will use wine, exactly as is done for fried ricotta raviole with wine dough, but white wine, and otherwise there are no constraints — and don’t worry: the alcohol evaporates during cooking, leaving only a delightful aroma. I recommend not substituting the wine with water, because it’s the wine that makes our calzones crisp, golden and dry with that unmistakable flavor! Let’s go to the kitchen — these fried calzones without yeast are amazingly good — but before we start cooking, if you want to stay updated on new recipes you can follow my page Facebook and my profile Instagram.

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Difficulty: Very easy
Cost: Very inexpensive
Preparation time: 30 Minutes
Portions: 5
Cooking methods: Frying, Stove
Cuisine: Italian
Seasonality: All seasons

Ingredients for fried calzones with spinach (no yeast)

2 cups type 0 flour
1 1/2 cups re-milled durum wheat semolina
1 cup white wine (Weigh the wine)
2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp salt (level)
1 tsp sugar
1 1/3 lbs spinach (fresh)
1 clove garlic
to taste salt
to taste extra virgin olive oil
5 tbsp breadcrumbs (about 5 level tablespoons)
14 oz mozzarella for pizza (good quality, or provola or caciotta)
1/3 lb speck
to taste sunflower seed oil (for frying, high-oleic)

Tools

Bowl
Pan
Frying pan

Preparation of fried calzones without rising

For this recipe, if you can use both flours do so — it’s not mandatory but recommended for the final flavor.

Gather the two flours in a bowl, pour in the wine, add the oil, salt and sugar, and start kneading.
First in the bowl and then on the work surface. Work vigorously until you obtain a smooth mass.
Elastic and homogeneous. Wrap it in cling film and move on to the spinach — I buy the cleaned, bagged ones. Pour a generous splash of oil into a large pan, add a clove of garlic and once heated add the spinach. Cook until wilted, which will take only a few minutes; at the end of cooking adjust the salt.
Drain and squeeze the spinach to remove excess liquid and divide the dough into 5 pieces, shaping them into balls.
Roll out each ball into a disk about 1/16 in thick (≈2 mm) and roughly 8 2/3 in (≈22 cm) in diameter. Fill with the spinach, the pizza mozzarella or the chosen cheese, sprinkle a level tablespoon of breadcrumbs to absorb the cheese moisture, add one or two slices of speck and fold into a half-moon.
Seal the edges well and prick the calzones with the tines of a fork. Pour sunflower seed oil for frying into a pan (it usually comes in red packaging and is indicated as high-oleic sunflower oil), and once hot, plunge in the calzones. The calzones should cook for at least 15 minutes or until evenly golden, so monitor the temperature by eye or with a thermometer (338°F) and turn them often.
Place the cooked calzones on a tray lined with paper towels and let them cool slightly before enjoying.
Here are our calzones!
Try to eat the calzones the same day; they are also good at room temperature. Alternatively, reheat them in a pan or oven (the microwave makes them soggy, so avoid it).