We’re fast using up all the adjectives for March 2020… ‘challenging’ times, ‘difficult’ days – I think we may exhaust them all soon. There has to be a peculiar irony that a year that should be defined by 20/20 perfect vision is the most unpredictable one most of us will have ever experienced. So it…
Tag: Quick Vegetarian Dishes
All Messed Up – Tourlou Tourlou
Some while back there was an advert on Greek TV for a brand of feta cheese. It showed a traditional village home with a man eyeing up a tray of freshly cooked stuffed vegetables – he calls out to his wife to see if he can have some. A rather old-fashioned, elderly lady comes into…
Blog-Pod – Arakás me Patátes – Braised Peas With Potatoes
In Greece, a country where vegetable recipes rule supreme, you rarely hear food described as ‘vegetarian’. The naming of someone as a hortofágos (vegetarian) is a relatively modern phenomenon, despite the fact that traditionally Greeks, especially in villages and islands, ate very little meat. Regular meat-eating came with growing urbanisation and relative affluence. But explaining…
The Brightness of an Island Easter – Lambrópites – Easter Pies
Back in the distant days of the mid-1980s, I was fortunate enough to spend a few years living on the Greek island of Kos – one of the Dodecanese group of islands, in the eastern Aegean. It is now known as a major ‘package holiday’ destination, but back then the original character of the island…
November Salad Days – Horiátiki Saláta Greek Salad
In much the same way as last year, November has found us in Athens again. After a few days of dappled, grey skies, the weather has reverted to type – the sky the deep azure of the Aegean, with a warmth reminiscent of late spring rather than early winter. Feeling blessed by this winter…
Dipping into Autumn – Kolokithosaláta and Pantzarosaláta – Two unusual mezé dips.
So that’s it… it’s officially autumn. It seems to have come around really quickly, and I suppose that’s the result of a disappointing summer season in England. Don’t get me wrong – I’m not complaining – but it is that lack of a good blast of bone-searing heat, that makes the onset of autumn…
Friendship and Flowers – Stuffed Courgette Flowers – Anthoús
Yesterday I cooked stuffed courgette flowers – anthóus. Not an easy dish to make in England. It is hard to come by the perfect, golden, courgette blooms – unless you grow your own, or maybe have a tame allotment owner, ready to relieve their prize vegetables of the flowers. The other day, though I…
Greek Food Myths No. 1 There’s no such thing as hummus!
As a sort of ‘Reality Check’, I feel I’m duty-bound to de-bunk some ‘Greek food myths’ and the first one is hummus – it’s one that really drives me nuts! THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS HUMMUS. OK, I can hear you all running to your fridges and checking that your pot of hummus is…
Rising Against Risotto Part 2 – Kolokithórizo – Courgette Rice
This is another of the wonderful vegetable-rice dishes. A simple but delicious mixture of courgettes, tomatoes and rice, It is popular in the island of Kithnos. I have adapted the recipe from the excellent book ‘The Fragarant Quince’ (Το Μυριστικό Κυδώνι) by Yorgis Venetoulias. Courgette Rice Serves 4 3 -4 courgettes 150 ml olive oil…
Rising Against Risotto – Spanakórizo and more
It has seemed to me for a while, that the arrival on the world’s dinner tables of Italian risotto has been an uncontested battle. Don’t get me wrong – I do love risotto. The creamy consistency, the still ‘al dente‘ grains of arborio or carnaroli rice, the wonderful intensity of flavour; and there is something…
kouzina 