Besides flavoring the iconic summer tomato salad, served as toping for crunchy barley rusks, or accompanying a myriad of vegetable dishes, here are two irresistible, yet simple appetizers with feta.
You can whip them up in minutes.
Greek cooking
Feta in Phyllo Packages
I first had this clever and simple version of feta package in Eumelia, the Organic Agrotourism Farm in southern Peloponnese. Marilena, the owner, cook, and instructor, served us a large, home-rolled phyllo and feta package, which, as she explained, she prepares in advance, freezes it, and then briefly fries in a hot oil skillet whenever she needs to present a quick snack or meze. Her twist on the common phyllo triangles served at most taverns, is that the thin slices of feta inside the frozen phyllo are adequately heated through as the package is briefly fried, becoming particularly delicious. The soft cheese does not disintegrate inside the crunchy phyllo, as in most versions of the appetizer.
Chef Uri Eshet at Kea Retreat serves the packages with sliced figs; you can pair them with other fresh, seasonal fruit and/or with fruit preserves. Drizzle with honey or any syrup, and sprinkled with sesame seeds or nigella, if you like.
I bet that this easy, convenient, and delicious morsel, whipped up with commercial phyllo, will become your next favorite appetizer. The pieces are quite filling, so one per person is enough.
To make 9 feta-phyllo packages (more…)
Chicken and Potatoes with Lemon and Herbs
Adding chicken to the iconic Greek Lemon-Oregano potatoes creates a dish very few people can resist. The potatoes by themselves often steal the show from any kind of meat they accompany, even from roasted lamb; baked together with chicken legs or breast they become the ultimate one-pot dish for every season.
I baked it in a very old copper casserole, over several layers of parchment paper, as the traditional inside lining of the is somewhat worn, and there are very few itinerant craftsmen to renew it.
This dish is particularly good on islands like Naxos, or here on Kea, where the local potatoes have exceptional flavor. If you want to cook this dish using small potatoes there is no need to peel them, but I suggest that you halve them, because they taste best when they can absorb the flavorful juices.
Makes 4 to 6 servings (more…)
Dried Fruit, Pistachio, and Orange Olive Oil Cake
A moist, fragrant, and barely sweet vegan cake that can be a treat with tea or coffee, or enjoyed as a snack any time of day. It should be made a day in advance, and it keeps for at least a week, getting better each day if stored in an airtight container at cool room temperature.
My mother used to bake a cake similar to this during Lent. We were not so religious as to follow the rules of the Church, which prohibited eating any food derived from animals during the forty days before Christmas and before Easter (and on many other occasions). We were simply continuing a family tradition which dictated that various foods or sweets should be made at a particular time of year.
The caramelized ginger, my recent addition to the recipe, enhances the rich flavor of this cake that has a dense texture, somewhat like an English fruitcake.
Makes one 12 X 5 inch (30 X 12cm) cake (more…)
The Seedy Grapes from our old Vines
Most of the grapes our vines produce hardly manage to ripen; wasps and all kinds of insects attack them as soon as they start to blush.
This year, though, we managed to harvest quite a few bunches to fill two large baskets. But our grapes are what the locals call ‘krasostafyla’ (wine-grapes), sweet but filled with seeds and quite difficult to swallow.
Early this August, as we finished harvesting the almonds, we noticed quite a few nice bunches of grapes hanging from the old, robust vines that engulf the southern fence of our property, behind the lemon trees. From these vines we mainly gather the tender grape leaves early in May, to stuff and make our trademark dolmades.
Usually the grapes our vines produce hardly manage to ripen; wasps and all kinds of insects attack them as soon as they start to blush. Come harvest time, we just find a few bunches of rotten, half-eaten grapes which are sweet but filled with seeds and difficult to swallow.
These vines are probably a remnant of the old vineyards our little valley was famous for; the dark grapes used to produce quite good wine in the old days, as I discovered researching the paper I wrote for the 2017 Oxford Symposium: (more…)