Greek Food Culture

Avgolemono is a tasty traditional Greek egg and lemon soup. However this dish can be served as a sauce as well, since it belongs to the family of eastern Mediterranean sauces made with egg and lemon juice combined with broth, heated until they thicken but before they boil, so the egg doesn't curdle. Avgolemono is the Greek name for egg-lemon; in Arabic it's called tarbiya or beida bi-lemoune "egg with lemon", and in Turkish - terbiye.

It is the classic sauce used on warm dolma and many vegetables, especially artichokes (Cynara cardunculus). As well as a part of some special stew-like dishes such as the Greek pork with celery and the Turkish yuvarlak, added just before serving to thicken and assimilate the cooking juices. In Middle Eastern cuisines, it is used as a sauce for chicken or fish.

As a soup, it customarily starts with chicken broth, though meat, fish, or vegetable broths are also used. Typically, rice or soup pasta, such as orzo, are cooked in the broth with thin strips of meat (chicken, for example) before a mixture of eggs and lemon is added. Its consistency varies from near-stew to near-broth. It is important to remove the mixture from the heat before adding the egg-lemon mix, in order to avoid curdling. The safest way to prevent curdling is to remove a cup of broth from the pot and let cool a little, then gradually add the egg and lemon juice while beating the mixture vigorously with a fork or whisk; once the broth is frothy, it is gently added back to the pot and the soup is served immediately. Leftover soup will invariably curdle, even if refrigerated or rewarmed. Its taste will not change but the texture and mouthfeel cannot be recovered.

One more noteworthy moment is that Avgolemono soup is made with whole eggs, but only yolks may be used. The whites usually are beaten first until soft peaks form and then the yolks and lemon juice are beaten into the whites until just combined. Whole eggs may also be beaten together without the initial separation. Starch may be added to the soup as an extra thickener, however, it is most often used if one omits the egg whites from the recipe, as the volume from the whipped whites create thickness.

Avgolemono Greek soup can be served hot or cold, in both cases it tastes great!

Horiatiki Salata or Greek Salad known in Greece as Village/Country Salad is a typical component of a customary Greek meal. It is one of the most well-known salads, especially throughout the summer months, in Greece and Cyprus as it is light, fresh, delicious, and so easy to make. True Greek salad is essentially a tomato salad made of sliced or chopped tomatoes with a few slices of cucumber, red onion, and feta cheese, seasoned with salt, black pepper, oregano, and basil and dressed with olive oil. Common additions include bell peppers, capers, anchovies, sardines and kalamata olives. Lettuce and vinegar are also used but not the main ingredient. A lettuce salad called "lettuce") is a distinct salad, also popular, especially in the autumn and spring, consisting of finely sliced lettuce, scallions, and fresh dill, and dressed with salt, black pepper, olive oil and red wine vinegar or lemon juice.

On the menu in every Greek restaurant and many non-Greek restaurants also, this delicious salad has a large diversity of different variations, but here it is the basics to work from. I would demonstrate the traditional recipe that does not include lettuce.

Here we go! First of all, prepare all your ingredients before you begin cooking, you will need:
- 1/4 pound of Greek feta cheese, sliced or cumbled
- 4-5 large, ripe, tomatoes
- dried Greek oregano (rigani)
- 1 large red onion
- 1 cucumber
- 1 green bell pepper
- of course top quality extra virgin olive oil and 1 dozen Greek olives (Kalamata, green Cretan olives, etc.)
- pickled pepperoncini hot peppers (garnish)
- 1 tablespoon of water (as option)
- and a sea salt

Horiatiki Salata recipe:

Wash and dry the tomatoes, cucumber, and green pepper. Clean off the outer skin from the onion, wash, and dry again.

Then roughly chop the tomatoes into bite-sized irregularly shaped chunks, removing the core. Salt lightly. Slice the cucumber into 1/4-inch slices, cutting slices in half (whether or not you peel the cucumber is a personal choice). Salt lightly. Slice the pepper into rings, removing the stem and seeds. Salt lightly. Slice the onion into thin rings.

After that, place all vegetables - the tomatoes, cucumbers, green pepper and onion, into a large salad bowl and mix. Sprinkle with oregano, pour olive oil over the salad, and toss. Just before serving, place the feta on top of the salad, either as a slice or crumbled (as in photo), and toss in some olives. Sprinkle the cheese with oregano (and pepper if desired), and as a final step, mix the oil and water and drizzle over the top, serve garnished with hot peppers.

Yield: 4-6 servings.

Optional extra ingredients: Anchovies: if this salty fish desired, add a couple to the salad before tossing. Also, if desired, toss in a few capers.

Greece's traditional cuisine is a archetypal Mediterranean cuisine sharing alike characteristics with the cuisines of Southern France, Italy, the Balkans, Anatolia, and the Middle East.

The most distinguishing and ancient element of Greek food is olive oil, which is present in almost every dish. It is produced from the trees prominent throughout the region, and adds to the distinctive taste of Greek food. The basic grain in Greece is wheat, though barley is also grown. Important vegetables include tomato, aubergine, potato, green beans, okra, green peppers, and onions. Honey in Greece is mainly flower-honey from the nectar of fruit and citrus trees (lemon, orange, bigarade trees), thyme honey, and pine honey from conifer trees. Mastic is grown on the Aegean island of Chios.

Greek cuisine uses some spices & flavourings more frequently than other Mediterranean cuisines do: oregano rigani, mint dhiosmo, garlic, onion, dill, salt, and bay laurel leaves. Other common herbs and spices include basil, thyme and fennel seed. Many Greek recipes, especially in the northern parts of the country, use "sweet" spices in combination with meat, for example cinnamon and cloves in stews. Greek flavour is often characterised by the use of mint and nutmeg. Other typical ingredients are lamb, pork, kalamata olives, feta cheese, grape leaves, zucchini and yogurt. The desserts are dominated by nuts and honey. The terrain has tended to favour the breeding of goats and sheep over cattle, and thus beef dishes are more rare. Fish dishes are also common, especially in coastal regions and on the islands. A great variety of cheese types are used in Greek cuisine, including Feta, Kasseri, Kefalotyri, Graviera, Anthotyros, Manouri, Metsovone and Mizithra. Some dishes use phyllo pastry.

Too much refinement is usually considered to be against the hearty spirit of the Greek cuisine, though recent trends among Greek culinary circles tend to favour a somewhat more refined approach. Typical Greek food is simple, colorful and packed with robust flavours. Many dishes show influences from the Greek past, having a distinctive style of their own which has not changed much over the years. Greek cuisine has a long tradition of fine cooking and the full range of Greek dishes usually remains undiscovered by the tourist.

Contemporary Greek cookery is archetypal of Mediterranean cuisine, making extensive use of olive oil, grains and bread, wine, fish, and various meats, including poultry and rabbit. Greece has an ancient culinary tradition dating back several millennia, and over the centuries Greek cuisine has evolved and absorbed numerous influences and influenced many cuisines. Legend has it that Klephtico (or Kleftiko) slow cooked lamb (or other meat) can be translated as 'stolen meat'. The Klephts, not having flocks of their own, would steal lambs or goats and cook the meat in a sealed pit to avoid the smoke being seen.

Some dishes can be traced back to ancient Greece: trahanas, skordalia, lentil soup, retsina, pasteli; some to the Hellenistic and Roman periods: loukaniko; and Byzantium: feta cheese, avgotaraho, paximadi. There are also many ancient and Byzantine preparations which are no longer consumed: porridge as the main staple, fish sauce nuc mam, salt water mixed into wine, etc.

Many dishes' names originate from the Ottoman cuisine tradition and their names reveal Arabic, Persian or Turkish roots such as moussakas, baklavas, tzatziki, yuvarelakia, keftethes. Many dishes' names probably entered the Greek vocabulary during Ottoman times, but there was earlier contact with the Persians and the Arabs. Some dishes may be pre-Ottoman, only taking Turkish names later; Ash and Dalby, for example, speculate that grape-leaf dolmathes were made by the early Byzantine period.

A few dishes are influenced by Venetian (Italian) cuisine, such as pastitsio, makaronia me kima, though pasta with meat together is considered in culinary circles as an "eastern" tradition, found mostly in Greece and Anatolia and Asia Minor and regions of that influence.

Recently, fast-food has also become more popular in Greece and Europe, with local chains such as Goody's springing up. Although fast food is gaining popularity and many major fast-food chains have opened all over Greece, the Greek people still rely primarily on the rich and extensive dishes of the Greek cuisine. In addition, some traditional Greek foods, especially souvlaki, gyros, pita/pites, for example tiropita and spanakopita (savory or sweet stuffed phyllo dough) are often served in fast food style.

Dining out has always been common in Greece. The Taverna and Estiatorio are widespread, serving traditional Greek home cooking at affordable prices to both locals and tourists.

Greek cuisine consists of a variety of dishes, and as mentioned above, Greek cuisine is very diverse and although there are many common characteristics amongst the culinary traditions of different regions within the country, there are also many differences, making it difficult to present a full list of representative dishes. Just to give an example, the vegetarian dish " Haniotiko Mpoureki" (oven baked slices of potatoes with zucchini, myzithra cheese and mint) is a standard, usual dish in the region of Chania (western Crete), which a family may consume 1-2 times per week in the summer season. Nevertheless, it is not cooked in any other region of Greece.