Greek Coffee

How about a revitalizing cup of Greek Coffee, just to sit down and share our news after these almost three months? You missed me right?

It smells like grandma's house! It smells hospitality! It smells like home!

I remember when I was a young (I still am, but let's don't go there for now), when my parents were having their siesta (afternoon nap), my sisters and I would prepare two delicious cups of Greek coffee and "accidentaly" would pass them out of their bedroom in order to wake them up and cease the "be quite" period of the day!

What we need for 1 cup:

1 mpriki 

1 cup of water

1 1/2 tea spoon of Greek Coffee

1 tea spoon of sugar (for medium, 2 tea spoons for sweet, none if it's for funeral)

Pour the water into the mpriki and put it on fire. After 1 minute pour the coffee and the sugar. Stir it well and let it become bubbly!

As soons as the surface becomes bubbly, take the mpriki out of the fire and pour some coffee in the cup. Return the mpriki to the fire and let it become bubbly once more. Pour the whole coffee in to the cup and... 

ENJOY!!!

The beginning of a new era!

Enjoy your international Frozen Margaritas this Friday night!

Pudding with milk and rice (Rizoghalo)

Such a familiar smell! Such an easy dessert! So healthy and yummy as there's no tomorrow!!!

Pudding with milk and rice (Rizogalo)

Ingredients

6 table spoons rice for risotto

2 cups water

6 cups milk (full fat)

4 table spoons corn flour

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 tea spoon vanilla powder

Procedure

Boil the rice into the water, until it drinks it all.

Start boiling the milk in another bigger casserole.

Disolve the corn flour into a bit of water.

As soon as the milk starts boiling add the rice and the sugar and stir constantly. Then add the corn flour. 

Stir the mixture in a fast way so as it becomes somehow curdy. Add the vanilla powder at the end, and then pour the mixture into small bowls.

Let it cool for 10-15 minutes and then transfer it into the fridge. In about 2 hours you'll have an amazing, refreshing, delicious and traditional Greek pudding!

TIP

Season with cinammon on the top for extra flavor!

Enjoy!!!

Greek yogurt

Greek yogurt with honey and almonds

What I mostly love about greek cuisine is the fact that the ingredients, the vegetables, the meat, the milk, the cheese that are produced here in the region are of high quality and that's actually the greatest asset to the taste that accompanies each dish!

Yogurt is of unique nutritional value and we count many many years back when it started being one of the basic foods for the Greek family.

Well, now, as you probably can understand, I may have tomatoes in my balcony, I do not have a cow though to walk around the zarntineries! Space-wise, not that convenient!

Ingredients
1 1/2lt milk, fresh milk, not of highly pasteurized
1 can of real yogurt, not the dessert-type, but the one that is quite sour and has, usually, a layer of crust on the top

Procedure
In a casserole, boil the milk until it reaches 40o C. In case we don't have a kitchen thermometre, the milk should reach a temperature that can be tolerated by your finger.
If you feel that the temperature is higher than 40o C, let the milk cool for a while.

Take 2* table spoons of the yogurt and put them ina glass (glass for water). Fill in the rest of the glass with the milk. Stir thoughly until the yogurt is disolved.
Pour the mixture from the glass into the casserole with the milk and stir nicely.
Now you can even leave the mixture in your casserole, or transfer it into a taperware, close it and keep it in a warm place for about 4 hours (in the summer months) and 6-7 hours (in the winter months).

Your yogurt is ready when it has taken a steady and massive shape.

When your yogurt is ready

Refreshing drink with yogurt!!!
How does this sound to you?

Add 2-3 table spoons of yogurt into a glass (for water) and then top the glass with cold water, stirring carefully while adding it until the yogurt is disolved. Enjoy!!!!

Refreshing drink from yogurt

Enjoy!!!

*In case you prefer a more sour taste, add 3 table spoons of yogurt.

Mouthful of zucchini

Here it is! Zucchini once again in all its glory!

Zucchini bites for an alternative gourmet proposition with a bit of my sister's resplendency!!!

You're gonna need:
1kg zucchini (small, medium, large.. the size doesn't really matter in this case!)
1 egg
2-3 cups of  toasted bread (crumbs)
2 fresh green onions, chopped into very small pieces
500gr feta cheese, into crumbs
salt (not much as we use feta as well)
pepper
peppermint
fennel
1 table spoon of olive oil

Mouthful of zucchini

Grate the zucchini into big thin sticks. Let them into a bowl with holes so as to get rid of the water. You don't want your balls to be watery! You can even leave it one night in the bowl in the frigde.

Now take all the ingredients and mix everything together and create small balls (like meatballs), while at the end you press each ball in between your two hands so that they can be fried evenly.

Fry your zucchini mouthfuls into a deep frying pan with plenty of olive oil, until they get the brown-golden colour.
Don't forget to turn them from the other side as well!!!!

NOTE
The texture of the mixture has to be thick and malleable so as to create steady and not watery zucchine bites. The secret is in the toasted bread. I say 2-3 cups, so you got to try and see the texture of your mixture. Add the toasted bread slowly and check on it; you feel like you need more, add some more.
If you make them really tight, roll the balls into some flour before you fry them and you'll be just fine!!!

TIP
They love the company of cheesy or yogurt-y dips. Try this one by mixing 1 cup of cream cheese with 1 chopped fresh green onion and a bit of peppermint.

Enjoy!!!

Meze with octopus in vinegar

Octopus + Ouzo = L.F.E.A.E*

Octopus in vinegar

Follow the procedure as in the Octopus with pasta (NOTE, steps 1-2).
After boiling it, cut its legs into two pieces each.
Put the pieces in an oven pan and bake in the grill mode for around 20 minutes (depending on the size
Keep in mind to turn your octopus so that it's baked equally from both sides.
Take it of the oven, pour some olive oil, vinegar and a pinch of oregano and you're ready to enjoy your ouzo!

Enjoy!!!


*Love for ever and ever

Risotto a la greque (a ha!) with tomato

I guess after all these recipes, you have already noticed that all , all, all, or maybe most of the all, recipes in the greek  cuisine start like that "We fry one chopped onion.."! It literally means to put 2 table spoons of olive oil into a pan or a casserole (depending the recipe), put it in medium fire, chop the onion, throw it in the oil, stir it a bit and leave it there for 2 minutes!!!
It's true!
Do you wanna learn to say it in greek and make fun at your friends?
"Tsagharizoume ena kremidi.."
Ok, we laughed enough for today, let's start cooking..

Risotto a la greque with tomato

1. Tsigharizoume ena kremidi and one green pepper (both chopped of course)
2. Add 2 cups of rice (for risotto). Season with salt and pepper. Stir the rice for 3-4 minutes.
3. Add 2 tomatoes cut julienne style. It would be better to peel off your tomatoes.
4. Add 4 cups of water for every cup of rice. So here, 8 cups of water!!
5. Ruffle (a new google translate word!) the food so as it doesn't stick to the bottom of your casserole.
6. It's ready when there is no water left; the mixture has to be thick and mushy.
7. Finish with some parsley before you remove it from the fire.
8. Serve with some sheep cheese, it's delicious!

Enjoy!!!

Mucus-y okra with chicken

Ah ah ah!
Forget what I have said so far! This is the most summer-y dish ever!!!
Ok, apart from whatever consists of zucchini!

Mucus-y okra with chicken

Take 1kg of okra and put them as they are into a bowl with salt and vinegar and let them rest in peace for 2-3 hours.
You have to do this, otherwise you'll find yourself eating the okra-mucus!

Take 2 chicken breasts and cut them into cubes. Fry them in a casserole with 2 tablespoons of olive oil until they change colour all around. Add 1 chopped onion, 2 tomatoes julienne, 1 tablespoon of tomato paste and a bit of chopped parsley.  Salt and pepper. Add enough water to cover the food and let it boil.
Just 3 minutes (ok, if it's 5 minutes, it's not a big deal... chill!) before your chicken is done, add the okra and stir it for 3-4 minutes.
Then, transfer the food to an oven pan and bake it in 220o C until -well it's classic now- it "drinks" all its water and only its juices with the olive oil are left (around 20-30 minutes).

Make sure you stir the food 2-3 times during the baking so as to avoid your okra to turn black.

Enjoy!!!

Octopus with pasta

How about cooking a small cute octopus for today?
It smells sea with a touch of the earthy bahar (allspice)!

Octopus with pasta

NOTE
Your octopus has to be frozen and then de-frosted in order not to be hard to cook. So even if you have a fresh octopus, put it in the freezer for one night and defrost it and cook it the day after.

1. Wash and clean the octopus, dry it nicely and the put it alone as it is in a casserole in medium fire. Let it release all its water and then let it drink it back.
2. Take it out of the casserole and cut it into small pieces.
3. Fry 2 chopped onions together with the pieces of the octopus. Add 2 tomatoes julienne, 2-3 leaves of laurel, 3-4 grains of allspice and a bit of pepper. Add enough water to cover the food.
4. Meanwhile, boil the pasta (preferably, I use the small macaroni with the hole, like in the picture) as advised in its package.
5. Add 2 tablespoons of the boiling water of the past into the casserole with the octopus.
6. Your octopus is ready when it has "drunk" all the water and only a thick sauce is left over.
7. Mix the pasta into the octopus and enjoy it with the glass of white wine.

Enjoy!!!

Greek sushi with grape leaves and rice (Sarmadakia)

The ultimate grandma delice! That when you visit her during the summer, it's the first thing that she will offer you to eat.. It requires love and tenderness to be prepared and a real technique in rolling the leaves.. A ha! it's not an easy task for everyone! It's nice to be confident, but keep it for another time, sweeties! he he..

Greek sushi with grape leaves and rice

So here we go:
100 grape leaves (leave aside around 10 leaves)
1 bunch of fresh green onions (around 7) - chopped in small pieces
3 handfuls of dill or fennel
4 cups of rice (Karolina or type for risotto)
3/4 cup olive oil
Salt, Pepper

In a casserole, heat up plenty of water. No need to boil it. Then take the leaves, 5-8 at time, and pass them from the warm water. Take them out with the big spoon with the holes and let them aside to cool.

Mix all the rest of the ingredients together.

Take each leaf open it nicely and put in the middle of its back side a teaspoon of the rice mixture.
Take the right side of the leaf and fold it upon the rice. Then do the same with the left side. Roll it once or twice and continue to fold the right end and then left end. Roll again until you have a smallie and cutie leafy roll! Continue with all the leaves.

Last, in a deep casserole, lay down the 10 leaves that you had left aside in the beginning. Lay your rolling around, and on the top of them in a tight way between them. Season with salt and pepper and pour a bit of olive oil and the juice of 1 1/2 lemon. Add 3 1/2 cups of water for every cup of rice that you have added.
Cook them in medium fire until they "drink" all the water.

TIP
Put a plate on the very top of the rollings so as to avoid them having them dancing and swimming in your casserole while boiling.

Serve with a Greek yogurt dip and enjoy!!!

PS: For questions and queries, ask for my grandmother's phone number. Thank you!

Sarmadakia

Enjoy!!!

Meat with eggplant

Take 1kg eggplants, cut them into cubes and put them into a big bowl with plenty of water and salt. We do this to un-bitter the eggplants.
Boil the meat  (1 kg of veal shoulder or neck, cut into pieces) untill it becomes tender.

Meat with eggplant

In a deep casserole, fry the pieces of eggplant in 2 table spoons of olive oil(make sure that you have drained the eggplants by simply squeezing them in your hand). Add the pieces of meat, 1 chopped onion, 2 green peppers in thin slices, 2 grated tomatoes, 1 glove of garlic into thin slices as well, a handful of parsley, pepper and salt. Now for the salt, you gotta try it because if you remember your eggplant has already been season with salt when we put it in the bowl with the water. Try it and sprinkle accordingly.
Add enough water so as to cover half of the food (half and a bit more) and let it boil for about 15 minutes.
Transfer the food as it is with all its juices into an oven pan and let it in the oven at 220o C until it "drinks" all of its juices and only the olive oil gives a nice texture to your ingredients!

Enjoy!!!

Eggplant Salad

Since you loved that much the meze with eggplant, I'll be nice and thoughtful so as to give you an alternative way to luxuriate of this lovely summer veggie!

Eggplant Salad

Take a big, white eggplant, wash it, put it in an oven pan as it is and bake it until it becomes soft (remember the fork!)

Take the eggplant out of the oven and let cool enough so that you can peel its skin off. Let the stalk for decor..your sweet eggplant will look like an imposing queen with her hat (no comments!).
Place the eggplant on a plate, cut it in square pieces like chess style; add on the top chopped 1 onion, 1 green pepper, 1 red pepper, salt, pepper, 1 handful of parsley, 1 glove of garlic into thin slices, olive oil, and vinegar.
How beautiful with all these colours!!! And it is an absolute yum experience!

Enjoy!!!

Dessert with semolina (Halvas)

Halwa in arabic means sweet.." anti halwa" is actually a very common phrase that men use to flirt with girls (innocent!)

Then in turkish that will be halva and then the Greeks took it and transformed it into this delicious, light desert!

Halvas

Ingredients

1 glass of olive oil

2 glasses of semolina

3 glasses of sugar (not 

4 glasses of water

1 cinnamon stick

3 carnation sticks

200gr nuts 

Cinnamon powder

Procedure

In a casserole, put the olive oil and the semolina and keep stirring them together till they get roasted - for 20-30 minutes (a very delicious smell will cover the air.. not the smell of burnt but the smell of the roasted deliciousness!). Let it aside. 

In another casserole or pot, add the water, the sugar, the cinnamon stick and the carnation sticks. In medium fire melt the sugar. Don't make syrop.. we don't need syrop. We just want to melt the sugar!

In the casserole with the semolina, add the nuts and roast them for 1-2 minutes. 

Then pour the sugar/water mixture into the casserole with the semolina and stir thoughly until it makes a sound like "floup floup" and small bubbles come out on the surface. Then after a 4-5 minutes, remove from the fire (when the bubbles become big and threatening.

Spread the mixture in and oven pan or in different types of coupe pate and let it cool!

Season on the top some cinnamon powder and here you have a quick and delicious desert!

Dessert with semolina

Enjoy!!!

Potatoes in the casserole (yiahni)

Potatoes yiahni is again very easy to prepare and it can work as a side dish as well!

Fry in a casserole a chopped onion with one cut green pepper into 2 table spoons of olive oil. Add the potatoes that you have previously peeled off and cut into pieces. Stir them around for 4-5 minutes until they take a nice crust from the outside.
Add two grated tomatoes, salt, pepper, a bit of sugar and oregano or peppermint. After 2 minutes add enough water to cover the potatoes and let it boil. Right before the potatoes are done, stir them carefully with a wooden spoon so as they don't stuck at the bottom. The juice that is left has to be thick (and not watery, like in the photo).

Enjoy!!!

Potato Pie with peppermint

Well, well.. today I have an alternative way of making a pie. Just to specify that a pie can take different kind of forms.. as long as there is the regular fillo-stuffing, it's called pie! It can be small and looking like triangle, it can be round, it can be square, it can be open, closed, semi-open..
Here, I used the so called Cypriot pies, they look like the Lebanese pies with the little pocket.

Potato Pie

Ingredients
10 Cypriot pies
8 medium size potatoes
Salt, Pepper, Olive oil, Peppermint (dry or fresh)

Procedure
Boil the potatoes into plenty of salted water until they become soft (try them with a fork).
Let them cool, and when you feel comfortable to touch them, peel them off.
Squeeze them with the potato squeezing gadget or, if not available, with a fork. Make a nice puree, add the olive oil (approximately 2 table spoons - you gotta try and see if you need more), the salt, pepper and peppermint. Mix them nicely and set aside.

Take the Cypriot pies steep them carefully so that they don't break. Steep them inside-out, but don't soak them wet. We do this, because as they are already prepared and ready to eat, they will be more sensitive in the oven that we are going to put them later to complete our pie. So if they are wet, they won't get burnt.

Lastly, spread some of the filling around the pie, and inside of it if you want, and then roll it around itself.
Continue with all the pies. Set the rollings into an oven pan. Spatter some water on the top of the pies, make some small holes here and there with a fork and bake them for 20 minutes at 180o C.

Enjoy!!!

Meze with baked red peppers

Under the 42o C and the percentage of humidity hitting the 52%, well, I need something exotic!
I heard that there was a cute guy named Christopher Columbus, after fighting with the seven seas and monsters and the distant Mayas* people, he brought the red peppers from South America to Europe and since then we, the humble, have the pleasure to cultivate them (in particular in Greece at the west part of Macedonia - Florina).

Cute story! Now let's bake the peppers!

Baked red peppers

Clean your red peppers, dry them, and put in the oven pan, over a baking paper. Bake them at 220o C, untill they start having bubbles on the top and getting black signs like if they get burnt. (around 30 minutes - depending on your oven and your peppers)

Take them out of the oven, put them in a bowl and cover it nicely. After 10 minutes, the peppers will be "sweaty" and that will make it easy for you to peel them off. So take their skin off, cut the stalks, open the each pepper in half and remove the seeds.
Now you can either let them at this shape or you can cut the into smaller pieces.
Put them in a plate, add some olive oil, vinegar and salt and you have a perfect starter!

NOTE
You can store the peppers in the freezer for as long as you want! After completing the procedure with the peeling and seeds, take your peppers and put them into plastic bags, seal them thoroughly (removing the air) and put them in the freezer. When you feel like eating them, take them out the night before and the next day they will be waiting for you ready and soft!

Enjoy!!!

*Remind yourselves that at the end of 2012, the red peppers will save us all!

Spinach pie

You remember the pies some posts below, right??
Now imagine that you're dying from boredom but due to the fact that you don't wanna die from hunger, eh you have to eat something... So you can easily bake one of the amazing spinach pies that you can find pre-made at the supermarket!!! mwahahaha

Spinach pie from the supermarket

But, since I am a nice person, I will give you the recipe for the original mixture..

Original Spinach Pie

Take 1kg of spinach, wash it nicely, chop it and after adding a pinch of salt, squeeze it so as to remove its water. After that, let it aside for 15 minutes to "rest" and get ride of any remaining water.
In a bowl, mix the spinach, with 2  handfuls of dill, 2 fresh green onions, chopped nicely, 500gr crumbled feta cheese, 2 eggs and pepper. Make a beautiful mixture and spread it on your fillo (if its the first time that you hear this word, either google it or refer to the recipes Bougatsa-Cream Pie and Cheese Pie).
For this recipe, use the thinner kind of fillo - 4 at the bottom, 4 on the top of the mixture. And don't forget to spread some olive oil in between the filla and to make holes with a fork of the top before baking it.
1 hour at 190-200o C.


Enjoy!!!

Pork in the casserole with oregano

Now that's a dish that everyone loves and enjoys! With a fresh slice of bread as the dish has amazing juice to dive in, you can luxuriate a relaxing lunch break! Po po po... I can still smell it!!!

Pork in the casserole with oregano

In a casserole, fry 1kg of pork cut into cubes in a bit of olive oil, until the meat gets the nice brown colour all around. Salt, Pepper, Oregano, plenty of lemon juice (2-3 lemons).. Let it "boil" in its juices for 15-20 minutes and you're ready!

NOTE
There should be left some juicy olive oil-lemon-pork fat sauce in your casserole.

Enjoy!!!

Calamari

Well, the one that I have here is not fresh by the sea calamari, rather than a pre-frozen edition of it, which is as good and cute and ready to cook!

Prepare a mush using around 1 1/2 cup of flour, 2 cups of water, 2 tbl spoons of olive oil, salt and pepper. This quantity should be enough for 500gr of calamari. The mush will creat a crunchy crust outside while the flesh will remain soft and juicy! Alternatively, you can only pass the calamari through flour and fry it straight after. The result will be similar.

Calamari

Season the calamari with salt and pepper, pass it through the mush and fry it in hot oil (using olive oil will give it a nice and a bit more light flavour). Pour on the top plenty of lemon juice and you have a delicious dish, ready in 20 minutes!

Enjoy!!!

Meze with eggplant

I'm sure you are all familiar with tzatziki dip.. the one with yogurt, cucumber and garlic. It's one of a kind and you sometimes find yourself willing to die for it (or because of it!*)

Meze with eggplant

Here, we have another dip, or meze would be more accurate.

Take a big eggplant, wash it nicely and put it in the oven. 200-220o C on a baking paper. The baking time will depend on the size of the eggplant; try to squeeze it with a fork and if it is soft and easily squeezable, it's ready. The eggplant takes a unique smoky flavour that makes it unforgettable!

Now, it's time to take it off the oven, let it cool until you feel comfortable to touch it and then peel the skin off. Melt the eggplant with a fork and add one melt clove of garlic, parsley, one red pepper cut into really small pieces, salt, pepper, olive oil and vinegar. Mix everything together and then you have a delicious creamy dip or side dish or whatever. Try it on crispy break and keep this secret for you!

Enjoy!!!


*For the record, my sources (googling the key phrase "deaths from tzatziki") indicate that no one has ever died from that.. so consume it with no fear!