GREEK -“KOUZINA” - Means Good Food – Part 1
Greece used to be known mainly for its Souvlakia and olives but for the past few years the world has come to realise that the Greek kitchen, or “Kouzina”, is much more than that. In Greece, in tavernas throughout the country, the proud taverna owner will usher his local or foreign guests into the “kouzina” to see what is on display for their culinary delight. Taverna owners who specialise in serving fish do the same, showing the catch of the day nestling in ice and just waiting to be grilled or otherwise.
The taverna is now familiar in almost every corner of the planet, almost every big city has several and some of them are marvellous, with their Greek owners, sometimes second or third generation Greeks or Cypriots, taking as much care as their mothers did in the preparation of Greek food, you’ll hear “Kali Orexi!” or Good Appetite, said very often.
The taverna is not the only place in which to taste Greek food. If one is lucky enough to be invited to a Greek home for a repast – and chances are an invitation would be forthcoming if you know a Greek as they are very hospitable - then the real Greek gastronomic delights come to the fore. The liberal use of herbs and plenty of fresh lemon is a distinctive part of the Greek flavour.
Greek herbs may be less well known and yet Greece has some of the finest herbalists in the world. The teas alone are peerless; from Camomile, marvellous for the digestion and calming for an unruly stomach, Mint (Diosmos), Tilio (mountain tea) all can be sipped, both hot or cold. Sage is good for mental acuity and Mint tea is especially refreshing, cold with ice, in the summer. One wonders if this found its way to the Deep South of the USA, or vice versa.
The use of herbs and spices in the Greek kouzina make for a wide variety of tastes and flavours. Herbs such as Basil (Vasiliko), Bay Laurel (Daphne), Dill (Anitho),the well known Oregano (Rigani), Cinnamon (Canella) and Thyme (Thimari), flavour all sorts of dishes. Cinnamon is used both in cakes and biscuits, plus it makes a welcome addition to the Greek dish Stifado (stew) usually made with rabbit or hare and plenty of tiny onions, with Cinnamon added for taste.
The list is endless and herbs can be found in most dishes, but in the main, Oregano is the most widely used, sprinkled onto salads, chicken dishes and meat, to bring out the flavour. Something should be said about the Greeks’ love of garlic and onions. There are many myths, now dispelled, which decades ago used to make the Mediterranean ,as a whole appear to reek of garlic if viewed from northern climes. Garlic is used in Greek cooking but not as widely as supposed.
The Greeks are just as worried about “garlic breath” as you or I, in fact garlic is a wonderful addition to many dishes, offering when used, a delicate, tangy flavour and this only becomes lusty when used in dishes such as Skordalia and Bakaliaro (garlic sauce with fried cod in batter). This traditional dish is mostly eaten on Evengelismo (Liberation Day) but on many other occasions too. This dish is hard to resist and when living in Greece I’d personally never met a foreigner introduced to it who didn’t just adore it.
Onions are used in salads, a village, or Horiatiki salad, is better with than without them, also in stews, chopped in hamburgers (Beeftakia) and vegetable dishes. The Greeks love to tell the story about the young uneducated village lad who was drafted into the army. When the sergeant told the soldiers to march left, right, left right, the lad was unable to follow. They reportedly hung an onion from his left ear and a garlic from his right and from thence the sergeant called out “onion, garlic, onion, garlic”.
Lemons and olives are prevalent in Greece (especially olives) and they are both used widely. Olives are mainly eaten as they are, for example processed either plain or with vinegar. Olives come from all over Greece and some prefer the fat juicy Kalamata green variety, while others the small black ones from other regions of Greece. Olive bread fast became popular in the Greek capital as a delicious new bread. It’s very healthy too. Lemons are nearly always squeezed, cut and put into food, or used to put on meat or fish dishes. In fact, no taverna worth its salt would dare to serve either dish without a wedge or two of lemon. They are also used as a salad dressing with oil when white cabbage, lettuce or “Horta” (a sort of greens or spinach dish) is served. It makes quite a change from using them only in your G&T.
Greeks anywhere love a lunch of Feta cheese or goat’s milk cheese, now widely used outside of Greece, with crusty bread and olives, washed down with wine or “Retsina” or Ouzo, the anise tasting appetiser. In summer they add to this simple repast, a village salad (Horiatiki), which consists mainly of cucumber, tomatoes, feta and olives and topped with onions and a sprinkling of Oregano, olive oil and lemon.
Cooking over a charcoal grill may not be special to Greece – half the world does this as BBQ in their backyard – but their cuts of meat and liberal use of herbs ensure tasty morsels when a grilled meal is in the offing. I recall one particularly memorable meal, enjoyed on a cold winter’s day after a long walk, somewhere inland past Varkiza (some 35km outside Athens) in a cosy but humble taverna. They were cooking lamb chops (Paidakia) and home made spicy sausages as the day’s speciality. Specialities they were.
The lamb chops were grilled in an open fireplace or hearth, on spindly twigs of dried Rosemary. The aroma alone was worth it and the resulting chops were delectable to say the least. The spicy sausages were fried together with cubes of cheese (Kefalograviera, a typical Greek cheese) and toasted bread, and were all marvellous. The memory alone makes my mouth water.
The Botanical name for apples is “Malus species” and there are some 25 species, and apples go back as far as the Stone Age. Today there are thousands of known varieties.
In brief, their history is hard to trace, but the common form of the wild crab apple “Malus pumila” is to said to be found growing over a wide area of Europe, western Asia and the Himalayas. The Egyptians, Greeks and Romans all cultivated apples and at the beginning of the 17th century varieties from England and France were imported into North America, and as they say, there’s nothing as American as Apple Pie.
Some apple species have probably gone forever and I remember in my first job in London, every morning I used to stop at a stall just off Baker Street and buy a beautiful red and shiny apple from the cheery fruit-stall holder. I would eat this delicious fruit, all fresh, sweet and juicy, before going in to work and it gave me tons of energy, so perhaps the adage is true after all. Alas I haven’t found an apple to quite equal it since, although I test many of them.
I like cooking with apples and although we once had a large and gnarled old apple tree in our garden, the abundance of fruit it produced year in, year out, is unfortunately too sour to eat. You can use them to produce “Apple Butter” - a type of very spiced up apple sauce and this is well known in the United States and is used with cold meats, on toast or whatever you want to use it for. The fruit from that old apple tree usually appears bunched up together 3-4 apples at a time. The real fruit, or that undamaged by birds, usually falls from early September for about a month.
Apple Pie was one of my mother’s best dishes and her pastry was a dream. Grandma’s best apple dish was Baked Apple and when I make either dish today, I recall the same feeling of delight the moment the dishes emerge from the oven. In a cookbook I was given by an Hungarian friend years ago “The Gourmet’s Cookbook” by Elek Magyar, (hardcover 1983) there are several apple recipes and in particular one entitled “Baked Apple and Sour Cream Charlotte” still brings back happy memories of Budapest. This is still available and this amazing and much decorated chef has many other volumes still in print, and by the looks of it, still printing!
Probably my other favourite recipe for apples is not really an apple recipe. The one I refer to is “Bourekakia,” which is a Greek recipe for small trianglular custard pies – delicious by themselves, but I sometimes add a piece or two of sliced apple (sweet apples) to each one and you could say it tastes a bit like apple and custard all in one mouthful. Rosemary Barron lists “Bourekakia” in her book on original Greek recipes¹ “Flavours of Greece, a unique book filled with wonderful recipes from all over Greece. Rosemary was founder of Kandra Kitchen, a highly praised cooking school on the island of Crete, described by US Vogue magazine as “one of the best cooking schools in Europe.. Little wonder that her recipe works. Having lived in Greece for many years I know authentic when I taste one.
A can write hundreds of apple recipes here but you have no doubt one of your own favourites. If you’d like to share one with us please feel free to send one in. we’d love to hear from you. Meanwhile, if you don’t already do so, bite into an apple, possibly one a day, and I can assure you your wellbeing will brighten and they taste so good.
Veronica Jason
November 2023
