The Greek Food

Category: Special

  • Greens with Eggs for the Poor …that eat like Kings

    Greens with Eggs for the Poor …that eat like Kings

    The following recipe -after doing some small research in Greek Blogs- is said to be common in Pilion which is in the center of Greece. Then again every place in Greece can easily claim that.

    Its pretty easy to make, its cheap, healthy and unique! Simple combination that tastes so good.

    For the following recipe, the essential thing is to be get whatever Greens are available near you at that time of the year. For this one i found spinanch but i guess you can make even better combinations if you try.

    INGREDIENTS FOR EGGS WITH GREENS

    – Whatever Greens like or are available.
    – 1 egg
    – 1 bunch of dill finely chopped
    – 1 small onion chopped
    – 1 can of tomato juice
    – Olive Oil
    – Salt/Pepper

    Wash the Greens really good. In deep pan, add some olive oil and heat it up. Throw the onions inside and stir but be careful not to burn them.

    Add the Greens and lower a bit the hit. Stir them and watch slowly the juices to evaporate.When there are no more juices left, add the dill and the tomato juice and leave them a little bit more.

    Oh! We forgot! Add some salt also!

    Now comes the tricky part! As our mixture gets a single form we need to add the egg on top. So create a small hole in the Greens and brake carefully the egg on top so it will be cooked.

    When its ready, add some pepper and slowly remove them with a spatula and place them to the plate.

    Next time i will try to add paprika also and see how it tastes!…

    Enjoy!

  • Pickled Octopus in a jar

    Pickled Octopus in a jar

    Whenever I am in Greece for holidays and I am out in a tavern eating with my friends there are some typical things that I always like to order just because I miss them so much when I am in the UK.  I could name a lot, squid’s , Greek souvlakia , and many more… but in this instance we are going to speak about octopus! J

    I don’t know but maybe it is a new year’s revelation for me to eat more octopus and try to cook it in different ways as I already tried it with pasta as they usually cook it in Greece but there are some other ways also.

    Ok, typically it is grilled, and being in Greece with the sun, it helps to have it most of the times like that.  Nevertheless, we are not in Mediterranean and recently in the UK we have been under constant rain for the last 2-3 months. Soooo…we are going to try it a bit differently.  We are going to try a boiled Octopus in a jar!

    Many people will not believe me but that was the way my mother was sending me octopus cooked all the way from Greece.  As you know by now Greek mothers can do all crazy stuff about their sons and yes that was/is one of them.

    The point about this recipe is that you can have it and keep it in the refrigerator for some days and always serve it as a starter or a side dish.  I am telling you it can hold! My mother was sending it all the way from Greece to UK when I was student together with other goodies…  Oh those were the times… 🙂

    Anyway, that’s how you should make your own boiled Octopus with vinegar in a jar

    • One Octopus! I don’t remember how big it was the one I had, but size does matter in those situations as it will get smaller in size after you boil it.
    • Vinegar
    • Olive Oil
    • Peppercorns
    • 3-4 bay leaves
    • 4-5 cloves of garlic
    • Oregano
    • One jar around 750ml that you have cleaned really good.

     

  • Oven baked omelet with Asparagus

    Oven baked omelet with Asparagus

    Ok, the story goes as follows… I wanted to eat an omelete and I already had one in mind with nice sausage mix. It was already late at night and I was really tired for anything complicated. In the process though I realised that if I didn’t cook some asparagus that I had then I would be forced to throw them away…

    Then, I found out on a recipe book that I have about a really nice oven baked recipe that they are doing –according to a book and this site (Greek)  – in Crete, Greece. Apparently, looking a bit online, one of the typical omelet’s in Crete is to mix the various greens that they have at the time, like asparagus and vegetables, creating a green omelet.

    I didn’t knew that… and unfortunately didn’t had all the ingredients.

     

    Either way, I didn’t mind because of two main reasons!

    1.  I was hungry
    2.  It looked really nice and I had to try it

    So, I added some of my ingredients, using the basic traditional idea…and it worked!

    INGREDIENTS

    • 3 eggs
    • 1 small bunch of asparagus chopped in small pieces
    • 3-4 baby courgettes chopped (That was my addition)
    • 250gr of feta cheese (I didn’t had Feta cheese at that point so I just used some Parmesan. It worked!)
    • 1 onion chopped (yeap, my addition that also… I like onions..)
    • Salt, Pepper,
    • Olive Oil!
    • A bit of milk

    AND THAT’S WHAT I DID!

    METHOD

    In a frying pan, add the olive oil and then in medium heat add the chopped onions, courgettes and asparagus and stir them slowly. In the meantime open the oven in 200c to pre-heat it.

    Beat the eggs with the milk. After 5-10 minutes the greens should be ready , a bit brownish. Add the cheese and stir again. Then add the mixture with the eggs to the pan and immediately remove it from the fire. Put it inside the preheated oven as it is in the pan and leave it there for 10-15 minutes.

    You will notice the omelet to grow thick and you can remove it when you like it. I usually wait to become a bit brown on the edges. Add some parsley if you want…sprinkle it on top. I just love how nice oven baked omelets taste without being so heavy in the stomach when you fry them.

    Well…enjoy!

     

     

     

  • Spinach pie for the lazy

    Spinach pie for the lazy

    I know that English are really proud of their pies but I have to say Greeks have some famous of their own. Which I have to say, I really miss them…  Most of the times when my mother used to make me spinach pie or cheese pies she had to do them on the largest pan she had as we always ate a lot of it. When I started to cook by myself, I have to say making a pie…any kind of, was out of the question for me as I found it really tiring and difficult to make the pastry. I tried when i cooked the galaktompoureko once..and it took me ages…

    So..instead, my all-knowing mother gave me the following idea…

    The following is a variation of the typical spinach pie recipe that is famous in Greece and it can be altered also to be used for a cheese pie. It’s a pie without pastry, which would elegantly make it, the spinach pie of the lazy one! As long as it tastes right, i have no problem admitting that i am a lazy chef 🙂

    LAZY SPINACH PIE

    INGREDIENTS

    • 1 kilo of Spinach chopped (fresh or frozen)
    • 2-3 fresh onions chopped
    • 1 red onion..also chopped
    • 500gr of trimmed feta cheese
    • 1 bunch of fresh dill chopped
    • 2 eggs
    • 14-16 slices of cheese for toast (the number depends on the size of your baking pan)
    • 250ml-300ml of pouring cream(i don’t know if I name it correctly…well..that) Alternatively, full fat milk will do i think
    • Olive Oil and Pepper

    REMEMBER if Spinach pie is much too complicated…you might want to check out also Spinach Rice!

    METHOD

    Well firstly you will need the biggest pot you have in order to fit everything. Put some olive and add the chopped spinach. Keep stirring them in high heat and you will notice that the spinach will be slowly decreasing in size and removing a lot of water

    Add the onions, the dill and half of the pouring cream and let it for 5 to 10 minutes reducing the heat to medium low. When you have seen that the spinach is now really soft and tender then you add the feta cheese to the mixture and remove it from the heat. Stir so the feta cheese goes everywhere and let it there to cool down.

    In a baking pan, you put half of the slices of cheese on the bottom so it covers as much as possible of the pan but also are close to each other. When the spinach has cooled down, then you break two eggs and beat them. When they are mixed you add them to the spinach mixture and stir quickly so they go everywhere. The reason why we don’t add them when the mixture is hot is so they are not cooked. We don’t want to have an omelet!

    Using a skimmer to remove as much as possible from the liquids we take the mixture from the spinach and put it in the baking pan spreading it to go all over the slices of cheese we have placed before.

    Add the remaining slices of cheese on top covering the spinach mixture and then add on top some of the pouring cream to cover the spots that were not covered by the cheese.Put it in the oven in around 200c and let it for 30-40 minutes. It’s ready! You can eat it while it is hot or when it gets cold also!

    Who said you need pastry to make a pie… 🙂

  • Octopus with Pasta

    Octopus with Pasta

    First blog of the year, and it will not be about the winter and the cold snow… Unfortunately I think in order the year to go well I need to write something that will remind mostly summer now.

    For a long time I wanted to eat some octopus while I was in London.  Its those things that I miss mostly while I am in London and the first ones that I am eating when I go back to Greece.  For some reason I had the believe that I wouldn’t be able to find a proper octopus around here unless I did go to some market… and as much as I would like to… unfortunately my boredom doesn’t let me and usually I prefer just staying in…

    Aaaanyway..

    I did manage to find after all a proper octopus once in my local fish monger and I didn’t let the opportunity to pass away. The following recipe is a classic in Greece and one that is most common during the time before Easter when Christian Orthodox is fasting.

    It has Greece written all over it (upwards downwards etc. etc.)  and is a must if you ever visit the country… Basically any recipe with octopus in my opinion…

    INGREDIENTS FOR PASTA OCTOPUS

    • 1 octopus fresh chopped in small pieces
    • 2 red onions chopped
    • 1/2 a glass of olive oil
    • 1/2 a cup of white whine
    • A small teaspoon of cinnamon
    • 1 tomato juice can
    • 500gr of pasta
    • Salt/pepper
    • parsley

    METHOD

    • Clean the octopus, really good and remove its mouth with its teeth.  Wash it really well and  cut it in small pieces.
    • In a deep pot,  add the onions for a few minutes being careful not to get brown.
    • Add the octopus for a few minutes until it changes color.  Throw in the seasonings and the tomato juice and let it boil for a few minutes.
    • Add the wine and let the alcohol vaporate.
    •  Fill it up with water and bring it to a boil. When the octopus becomes soft, add the pasta in.
    • Continue to boil the mix until pasta is ready.
    •  Make sure that there is some juice inside from the sauce, remove from the heat and add salt/pepper.

    Serve sprinkling some parsley.

     

     


    Greek Stewed Octopus in Tomato Sauce with Pasta