Pan-Sized Phyllo (Filo) Pies (19) Filled Pies (12) Fresh Cheese Pie with Fennel from Kalavryta Cheese Bread from Laconia – Protsouma Cretan Meat Pie – Kritiki kreatopitta Kalitsounia with Spinach – Kalitsounia me Spanaki Cheese Crescents – Kalitsounia me Mizithra – Cretan Sweet Cheese Pastries – Kalitsounia Glikia me Mizithra Cretan Boureki Zucchini and Potato Pie Pumpkin and […]

Tyropsomo me Halloumi (Cheese-Bread with Halloumi) Halloumi Cup Cakes (Cheese Muffins) Paskies me Prozimi (Lamb and Cheese Pie with Sourdough) Cypriot Black Olive Pies Kolokotes (Squash Pastries) Glystarkes (Sweet Sesame Rusk’s) Flaounes (1) (Easter Cheese Pastries) Easter Flaounes (2) Eliopita (Black Olive Bread) Chicken pies Cyprus pitta recipe Kattimeri Cyprus recipe

FOGATSA Makes 2 large round loaves In Corfu the Venetian influence is echoed in the island’s Easter bread, which is called fogatsa. Unlike the braided tsoureki eaten everywhere else in Greece, here the Eastern spices mahlepi and mastic are nowhere to be found. Instead, fogatsa is a dense, high, round loaf, with a cross slashed into its center and flavored with […]

SARTSA – frangokota Guinea fowl in the Ionian region might have an interesting history—or, at the least, an interesting etymology, if one is to believe historian Waverley Root. The Zakynthians call it frangokota, or “French chicken,” while in Corfu it is called faraona, after the Italian gallina faraona, or pharaoh’s turkey. Root says that the bird, indeed a native of Guinea in […]

KEFALONITIKI KREATOPITA This recipe, from native Cephalonian Roussa Meleti, originally appeared in my first book, The Food and Wine of Greece. Makes 8 to 10 servings Ingredients: 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for brushing 1/2 pound boneless lamb, trimmed of fat and cut into 1/2-inch pieces 1/2 pound lean boneless pork, cut into 1/2-inch pieces […]

MARITHOPITA TIS LEFKADAS Makes 8 to 10 servings Ingredients: 4 pounds small picarel, gutted and washed 2 medium onions, finely chopped 1 cup short-grain rice Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste 2 tablespoons tomato paste diluted with 1?4 cupwater (optional) 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for brushing 1 recipe Basic Homemade […]

KEFALONITIKI PITA ME KOLOKYTHA KAI KAROTA Makes 6 to 8 servings One finds recipes in the most unusual places, in this case from Spiros Bazigos, the accountant at the Coridalenio Library in Argostoli, Cephalonia’s capital. I had just spent a day looking for books on old island customs and food habits. He had come in to say good night to […]

MELITZANES SKORDOSTOUMBI – Μελιτζάνες σκορδοστούμπι This simple dish is a paean to the robust flavors that mark so much of Greek and Ionian—cooking. Garlic and vinegar are a combination we find on country tables all over Greece, but usually it is one reserved for seasoning meat. Its use here with eggplant is what makes it unique. Makes 4 to 6 servings […]

MELOMAKARONA ME ELAIOLATHO This is one Peloponnesian version of a traditional Christmas cookie. The region’s telltale ingredient, olive oil, replaces butter in this recipe. Sometimes, Greek cooks will do that—replace butter with oil, that is—to transform a sweet into something permissable for fasting. In the Peloponnesos, though, the use of olive oil is the norm rather than the exception. Ingredients: For […]

KOURAMBIETHES ME ELAIOLATHO APO TO LEVITHI Makes about 72 shortbread cookies Ingredients: 2 cups extra-virgin olive oil 2/3 cup granulated sugar 1/3 cup ouzo 1/2 teaspoon baking soda dissolved in 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice 1 cup finely chopped walnuts Grated zest of 1 lemon 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 4 to 5 cups all-purpose flour, […]