Austerity cuisine: Life of Pie

My proofreading and translation work often takes me through culinary journeys - here is what I've been working on for a little while now.

The culinary concept of πίτα (PI-ta = 'pie') is an ancient one, and there is no culture in the world that does not have some kind of pie in its culinary repertoire: some kind of filling stuck together or enclosed in a flour-and-water mixture which can be as dry as pastry, or as sludgy as batter. Pie fascinates us because an uncut pie is mysterious, as it does not reveal its contents, so that we have only its aroma to estimate its inner secrets. Like bread, pie is a portable meal, with the added luxury - unlike that of bread - of being a complete meal that does not need assembly. Pie is also one of the most creative culinary offerings of the primitive kitchen. The basic rule in making pie is that there are no rules, hence the pie each person creates can be as original as s/he wants it to be. It is this basic rule that makes the Greek pita so versatile, and so important in culinary history: pie can be as rich - or as poor - as you can afford to make it. And for this reason, pie embodies all the facets of austerity, as it makes use of anything and everything: unlike soup which is an equally austere meal, pie can be carried anywhere and everywhere, so that it can be eaten by the very poorest people working far away from their homes.

The oldest forms of Greek pita may contain just flour and water, with some honey and nuts sprinkled over them, as in saragli from Northern Greece, and xerotigana from Crete:

"The ancient history of the pie in Thrace starts from the sludge created by the mixing of water and flour, i.e. the milled grain. This trophic symbol is to this day in Thrace still called ‘genima’ (birth). This sludge, which was baked in the shields of the warriors of antiquity and in Thrace still continues to be baked on a heated stone or iron surface, to be offered as a ritualistic dish, then became a round dough that is flattened and baked on flat stones. The various ‘palakountia’ and the ‘koptoplakountio’ of the Byzantines, with a pastry sheet on the top and bottom, and a filling of hazelnuts, almonds and honey in between, or the ‘tetyromenoi plakountes', are the first forms of pie, and they are the memories that keep the taste of the spiral-shaped or ‘curly’ pies of Thrace." (cf. Angeliki Giannakidou, Thracian pita)

Most pita ingredients originate from small-scale cultivations of garden vegetables, eggs and milk. Meat pies (kreatopita) have always been considered an extravagance - even today, a meat pita in Greece is usually made for Easter or a special occasion:

"The animals needed to produce the dairy products, usually chicken, sheep and goats, were reared in the household for the purposes of consumption, and it was almost unthinkable that a household would not produce whatever was required in order to feed its members." (cf Maria Fakiola, Corfiot pita)

But producing so much food for the daily needs of the - often large, in past times - family household was very hard work and on a very regular basis, the food supply would be supplemented by nature's offerings, hence the abundance of wild greens in the Greek pita which are used to make hortopita:

"The greens used vary depending on what thrives in every area, and it mainly constituted sorrel, kafkalithres, fennel, sowthistle, chard, galatsides, poppies, myronia, and nettles. These pies are primarily called ‘hortopites’ (Imvros, Molyvos in Lesvos, Chania in Crete, Mykonos and Evia), or ‘lachanopites’ (cabbage pies), ‘marathopites’ (fennel pies) and ‘tsouknidopites’ (nettle pies) according to the filling, while they are referred to as ‘gemostopites’ in Karkinagri of Ikaria." (cf Ourania Rapti, Aegean pita)

Given the nature of the Greek pita - a frugal meal that can be made from virtually anything - pita epitomises austerity:

"... as the economic and cultural activity of a society is heavily influenced by the natural environment, it is only natural that primary ingredients for food meet the circumstances which they define." (cf Eleni Bintsi, Vlach pita)

Yet, despite its economical basis, pita can be dressed up for any occasion. It can take on religious significance and be prepared ritualistically, as in the fanouropita, made in honour of St Fanourios, finder of lost things:

"Fanouropita ... is made with seven ingredients: oil, flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, water. ... From oral accounts we also know that fanouropita can be made with seven or nine ingredients (oil, flour, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, water, dried fruit, and orange)." (cf Rodoula Stathakis-Koumaris and Chrysafa Tsonou, Gaslaxidi pita) 

Where a paucity of basic ingredients was experienced, both the sweet and savoury could be combined; with the addition of rice and using an intricate manner of rolling the pastry, a 'richer' offering could be produced, as in the case of bubari:

"... bubari is a sweet Lenten pie with a spinach base ... Bubari is a very oily pie, since, in Megara, there has always been an abundant production of olive oil (an ancient variety from Central Greece, local subspecies of ‘Megaritiki’ of Olea europaea  var. Media oblonga, both an oil and table olive). The spinach was grown in local orchards and home vegetable gardens, and the (seeded) raisins used came from a local grape variety with small berries that locals dried in their homes. Traditionally, they did not purchase any of the basic materials, since every family produced its own products, even the flour. In order to both provide a main meal (for lunch) and also prepare enough pie in an economical way for the needs of the family, sometimes rice was added. The most common form of the pie is ‘bubari’, ie rolls in the shape of candy." (cf Maria Kalozoumi, Megara pita)

In line with the concept of austerity, nothing was wasted. Even an ingredient regarded as 'useless', like the unused squash that was left over from the previous autumn and had made it through to the spring, would be treated like royalty, and a special feastday would be assigned to use it all up, as in the kolokithopita (pumpkin pie):

"Kolokithopita in the Messinian town of Thouria is prepared by housewives and consumed only during the first Saturday of Lent, on the feast of Sts. Theodore... The main basis for the preparation is dry yellow squash (pumpkin)." (cf Elli Prasinou-Favvata, Messinia pita)

These days, I myself rarely make a galaktoboureko without adding pumpkin: pumpkin bougatsa and pumpkin galaktoboureko are now standard dishes in our house when I have pumpkin.

When we think of the Greek pita, we usually think of pastry, thick or thin, wrapped round a tasty filling. But making filo pastry is not an easy task, and certainly not an everyday one, so that, and in many cases, there was not enough time to make the filo pastry for a pita, which, in contrast to the pastry, had to be made with some urgency, in order to feed the family and guests. Thus, in many cases, we see recipes for self-crusting pita:

"The Peloponnesian mountainous hinterland is a place with a long tradition in sheep and goat breeding, both transitional and permanent. In the mountainous area of Olympia, namely in a small village just outside Andritsena, the Alifeira (Rogkozio), I tried two milk-based pies. Both summarize the most characteristic element of the food traditions of Morea - and in general, of Greece: austerity. This was manifested in the korkofigki, made during the period when lambs and goats are born, at the beginning of winter; and galopita, prepared with special care, mainly on Holy Saturday, to be eaten as a dessert at the festive table on Easter Sunday. Its flavor reminds one of galaktoboureko (Greek custard pie), but without containing pastry or syrup. (cf Yiannis N. Drinis, Peloponnesian pita)

"The types of pie are many and various: pies with home-made pastry, the leading role played by the hortopita (with wild greens collected from the region and spinach), as well as cheese pie, spiral pie known as ‘strifti’ (with cheese and sugar), milk pie and porridge pies such as mamaligka and bambanetsa. The name mamaligka is known in the Balkans and refers to a sludgy porridge mixture made with cornmeal. Mamaligka is a custom of Fthiotida, made with a kind of porridge originating from wheat flour to which cheese and zucchini or pumpkin are added. It is not covered with pastry, but egg is brushed over it, mixed with oil and sugar. It is thin, so as to cook quickly, and it is always cooked till the top is crusty." (cf Fotini Tsonou, Lamia pita)

The pies described above remind me of zimaropita, which a friend taught me how to make.

Often, pita is made with the poorest of ingredients - wild greens, foraged from the countryside, a sign in older times that one did not have enough food of one's own for the nutritional needs of one's family.  Identifying greens in the countryside is almost a dying art, but now with the crisis, it has had a revival. Wild greens make the most aromatic, the most redolent, and the most highly prized pita:

"Most pies in the Cyclades are made in the spring, since the nature of the area in the spring generously offers a wide variety of wild and domesticated leafy greens. (cf Nikoleta Delatola Foskolou, Cycladic pita)

Where wood is scarce, as in the Cycladic islands, pita is not baked, but fried in individual portion-size pieces, which requires less cooking time:

"The ‘seskoulopita’ or ‘seskoulopitaki’, a sweet pie, is made in Tinos at Christmas. Seskoulopitaki is based on chard, but also contains walnuts and raisins. It is flavored with ground cinnamon and cloves, and chopped mandarin, and is sweetened with molasses and a little sugar. The filling is wrapped in handmade pastry kneaded with orange juice, egg and oil. If the recipe is made as a larger pie, it is usually baked in the oven, whereas when individual serving-sized seskoulopitakia are made, they are fried, and then sprinkled with powdered sugar." (cf Nikoleta Delatola Foskolou, Cycladic pita)

These smaller pies require a lot of work, which is often done collectively:

"Such a task becomes monumental because the preparation of these desserts is time-consuming; since most women on the island have to prepare several dishes for the festive Easter table, they tend to make them in groups to help each other. Hence, they go together in groups of 2-3, maybe more, depending on the number of pies they have to make. Every woman assumes a role, depending on her skills. Some deal with the rolling out of the pastry, others with the preparation of the filling, another with the "pinching" of the pastry into a thin pleat." (cf Nikoleta Delatola Foskolou, Cycladic pita)

Small pita, and self-crusting pita, are the traditional pita offerings from the island of Crete, and they are all fried in olive oil which is found in abundance all over the island:

"With a focus on the local ingredients and cooking methods, the most widespread pies in the countryside and the urban centres of Crete are the pies cooked in a pan, like the ‘hortopites’ (wild greens), marathopites (dominated by fennel), cheese pies (sour, sweet or savoury with mint), ‘nerates mizithropites’ (the dough is fried while still wet), ‘sarikopites’, ‘agn(i)opites’,  ‘kreatotourtes’ (meat pies), the pies of Sfakia, etc. A second category is the baked pies, like ‘tzoulamas’ (dominated by rice), ‘mizithrompoureko’, the light pies that remind one of cake, with the most popular one being raisin pie, etc." (cf Angeliki Baltatzi, Cretan pita)

My favorite kind of pastry pita is one that uses filo pastry in between the filling. It is a favorite all over mainland Greece:

"In Zagori, pies with pastry contain 5-6 thin sheets. Two-three are laid on the baking sheet and brushed with a little oil, one is tucked between the ‘anademi’ (filling), baked dry in the oven to hold the excess liquids, and another two to cover the pie." (cf Calliope Stara, Zagori pita)

This is the kind of pita that I make the most often for my household. These days, we rarely cook pita in the electric oven - the austerity lifestyle forced on us bought back the wood-fired heater into our home and our one comes with an oven compartment. I also make pita in the cooler seasons - heating up the home in summer is unthinkable!

We often think of pita as mainly a gender-oriented task, a woman's job. The solitary life of the Aegean fishermen proves this not to be the case. Their fish pie was probably fresher than the pita their wives served them when they came back home:

"The ‘atherinopita’ (smelt pie) of Kimolos is a dish that is found in several islands of the Cyclades... It started as a recipe made by fishermen who, when they got a good catch, held onto a part of it to make this ‘instant’ pie. The fish mainly used for the preparation of the pie is mostly the thin grey-blue 'sea spray’, called ‘atherina’ (Atherina hepsetus). Its length varies between 8 and 15 cm. They also prepared the same pie to take with them when they went out fishing. They would often make it in their boat. It's a pie that is very simple, easy and quick to make, with small fish, flour and onion, which, as they are mixed together and fried over a hot fire with plenty of olive oil, form a kind of pie." (cf Nikoleta Delatola Foskolou, Cycladic pita)

The importance of having the appropriate pie-making skills is also exemplified in the many proverbs and sayings that abound in the regional dialects of Greece:

- «πίτα έχεις; έννοια έχεις» "You got pie? You have passion" meaning the daily care and constant attention needed for the preparation of a meal,

- «πότε πίτα και φλασκί, πότε πίτα μοναχή» "Sometimes pie and flask, sometimes pie alone" concerning the adequacy or otherwise of provisions (sometimes, we have wine to drink with our pie, but other times, we will have just the pie),

- «πίτα ’κεί που μέλλεσαι και όχι εκεί που ψένεσαι» "Pie for where you will go, and not where you want to go" when something ends up at another recipient other than the one it was intended for,

- «όπου πεινά, πίτες θωρεί, κι όπου διψά, πηγάδια» "Whenever hungry, he sees pies, and whenever thirsty, wells", 

- «από πίτα που δεν τρως, τι σε μέλλει κι αν καεί;»"Of the pie that you will not eat, why do you care if it burns?", 

- «πόσες βουκιές είν’ η πίτα; κατά το δαγκανιάρη» "How many mouthfuls is that pie? It depends on the biter" in reference to the truth or the result of a project),

- «ο καθείς την πίτα του για αφεντιά την έχει» "Each one to his own pie", with the a similar meaning to the 'an Englishman's home is his castle', 

- «η πίτα που θα μ’ ευφράνει αφ’ το φούρνο φαίνεται» "The pie that I will indulge in can be seen from the oven", meaning that we usually know how something will turn out,

- «ζεστή είναι η πίτα νόστιμη» "The pie is delicious when it’s warm" for the importance of timely action. (cf Ourania Rapti, Aegean pita)

Indeed, where would be without pita? 

I have not included any photos in this post, but if you would like to look up some of the recipes mentioned, many are given in my blog. Choose the underlined words in the above text, paste them in the search box on the top left-hand side, and you will find photos and recipes of similar pies as those being discussed here. Click here for a set of photos showing the many different kinds of pita I make. 

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Steak and kidney-less pie

One of our more memorable meals in London was taken on New Year's Eve at the Battersea Pie Station in Covent Garden. We had ended up there after attempting a walk along the Thames, starting from Cannon St. At Blackfriars, we were stopped by the crowd and safety control units who were policing the area and keeping people away from the riverside, due to the fireworks event that was schedule to take place later in the evening. Our detour away from the riverside took us through some very London sites of great historical interest. It almost felt Dickensian.

Poultry obviously takes its name from its former association with the chicken trade.

We were intrigued by what looked like a private function with a focus on seafood...

... and highly unamused by this vile-sounding Christmas food special! (It has been described as: "An overwhelmingly negative reaction, ranging from 'aggressively disgusting' to 'one of the worst things I’ve ever put in my mouth'. It gets points for effort, attempting to combine virtually every festive ingredient, but it tastes like someone has pushed their Christmas leftovers into a blender and served them with rice.")

New Year's Eve is a very quiet day for London business people, but even when London is supposedly sleeping...

... it keeps changing looks, as it prepares for various events, and this time, the portaloos made it look like it would be welcoming the New Year with a heavy bout of drinking.

We eventually needed to use a bathroom ourselves, so I popped into a Pret-a-Manger and bought some Christmas mince pies which I'd really wanted to try while in London.

When I asked for the bathroom facilities, believe it or not, this place did NOT have toilets! So we held off, in the hope that we would eventually find a place to take a leak legally.

At The Strand, the former Aldwych tube station, often used as a film location, looked ghostly silent. This street was cut off to strollers due to the fireworks event.

Somerset House was looking very festive with its ice rink (where we found some free bathroom facilities).

I had a quick browse through the ridiculously overpriced Fortnum and Masons shop (it was sponsoring the ice rink) - 50 pounds for a set of 6 Christmas crackers, did I read that right?!

A short stroll away, we found ourselves at Covent Garden. Cold weather makes you feel hungry all the time. I chose the Battersea Pie Station, in the hope that I would find some steak and kidney pie (and Cornish pasty - another of my favorite pies in New Zealand). We weren't disappointed. My family lets me do the ordering most places when in London, because they know I know the food well enough. My early life in colonial New Zealand stopped abruptly just when New Zealand's food tastes became more international, so I still have fond memories of New Zealand old-fashioned comfort food, which were invariably British-based.

Chicken and mushroom pie, steak and kidney pie, and Cornish pasty - ~20 pounds, with a bottle of beer and a cup of tea.

Back home, when I decided to make a steak kidney pie myself, I found it near impossible to find kidneys! In Greece, the sale of beef and chicken kidneys has been banned since the mad cow furore - which started in the UK; yet, they aren't banned there! Although lamb's kidneys are still available for purchase here, when I tried to track some down, I found that they are never severed from the actual animal, so you have to buy the part of the animal that they are connected to. This is done for transparency reasons: in this way, the butcher is showing you that the animal was healthy - if the kidney is missing, the buyer may wonder whether the animal was sick. 

I used this very easy-to-follow recipe as the basis of my beef stew and pastry. The beef stew was cooked last night, the pastry was made this morning, and we had the pie for lunch with some leek and potato soup. 

To replace the umami taste of the kidneys, I bought a packet containing two slices of kavurma, adding some mushrooms and soya sauce (I was out of Worcestershire sauce) to my beef stew. I think the taste was successful, and the whole family enjoyed the pie, which will be made again eventually, because I froze half the stew. Slow-cooked food takes a long time to cook, so why not make a double batch and save your time later?

Bonus photo: A chat with the butcher where I bought the beef also revealed another mysterious EU meat regulation, which forbids lamb's spleen from being sold - but cow's spleen is permissible!

At any rate, if you have close relations with someone who raises their own meat, you can procure everything. I had lamb's spleen in sheep's intestine last week at an inner-city cafe bar, where the landlord-owner-cook prepares everything freshly and to order.

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Spanakopita pancake-omelette

I felt a tinge of horror as I read the T-shirt logo: SAVEFOOD, with links to the websites of Boroume (= we can) of Kalyteri Zoi (= better life). Cutting down food waste has been a rule of life for me for a long time.

Ventures like these are of course an outcome of the crisis, although I would argue that the effects of the crisis would not have been felt so strongly if we had always believed in a better life, with an emphasis on cutting down waste of any sort.

The Kalyteri Zoi site leads to a pdf e-book entitled: ΔΕΝ ΠΕΤΑΜΕ ΤΙΠΟΤΑ! (= we don't throw anything out), containing 25 recipes submitted by home cooks on how to use leftovers in a new meal, again something I'm well versed in; I've had a leftovers label on my blog since its inception. (And again, I can't help thinking that no one was listening when they should have been.)

The recipes include fritters made from leftover boiled potato, savoury loaf filled with whatever's on hand and carbonara made with leftover bifteki (meat pattie), to cite a few recipes. What's more, some of the recipes include English names, eg αμπελοφάσουλα reloaded, never the same pie and harlem cake. There is a clear emphasis on making something new with something old, based on the desire to keep life interesting despite its sameness.

You can make Greek pies the lazy way by rolling out just two pastry sheets and using one layer of filling as listed here. In this way, you will get more than one pie (one for eating and the others for the freezer), as each pie turns out thinner.

Cooking with leftovers has never frightened me. I find it a very challenging way of being creative int he kitchen, together with finding free food sources. Last Sunday, after making spanakopita (spinach pies) both for eating and freezing, I had some leftover mixture which I couldn't use because I had run out of pastry. (Pie-making is one of those things where you may end up with leftover pastry or leftover filling.) I turned it into a dinner for two that evening, adding some kitchen staples.

You need:
2 cups of uncooked spanakopita filling (spinach, herbs, seasonings, onion and soft white cheese - I rarely add egg to the mixture, but it may contain some)
1 egg
3-4 tablespoons of flour
3-4 tablespoons of water
2-3 tablespoons of olive oil

Mix the leftover spanakopita filling witht he egg, flour and water. Mix in just enough water and flour to make the mixture sticky but not doughy. but don't worry if you add too much flour or water; the end result will either be a pancake (if you add too much flour) or a filling omelette (if you add less flour). I think mine came out to something in-between.

Heat the oil in a medium shallow frying pan till it's very hot. Spoon the mixture over the hot oil, spreading it to cover the whole pan. Let it cook on high heat on one side, then turn it over to cook on the other side. Becauce the pancake-omelette will be too thick to flip, turn it out onto a plate, then turn the plate over back into the pan. Don't worry if it breaks up - it will reshape and stick back together in the pan.

All you need to go with the pancake-omelette is some bread and wine. And even if you don't have that handy, this leftovers meal will still taste like one of the best meals you have ever had. And if the spinach came from your garden, and the eggs came from a local farmer, such a meal will also be one of the most localised, seaosnal and frugal meals you have ever eaten.

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Perek (Περέκ)

I recently came across a recipe that uses some kind of pre-cooked filo pastry, called perek. Perek is a kind of filo pastry made only from flour and water. Home-made perek can be stored for up to a year. As I make all my own filo pastry needs myself, I thought it would be a nice idea to have some filo pastry ready to use when I need it, without having to worry about when I would find the time to make the dough and roll it out.

Kiria Martha's perek is famous in Thessaloniki. Her son continues to make them in the family taverna. Note the hot plate an the left, sitting on coals in the fireplace.

The origins of perek are mired in the diaspora Greeks of the Pontus region. A friend from Northern Greece saw my perek when I presented them on my facebook page, and she told me a little story: She recalls that her grandmother was able to cook a pita very quickly, without much preparation, and she always wondered where her grandmother found the filo pastry to do this, especially since she too made all her own needs, and never bought it. So a kind of perek was and is still being made by Greeks within and outside the borders of the country.

I really enjoyed making perek for the first time, using this recipe. It looks a little like crispbread, and can also be used as chips for a dip. The perek is moistened before use when using it as filo pastry, a bit like spring roll wrappers. I decided to use my regular spanakopita filling to use my perek. With the following recipe, I got 10 rounds as big as a medium-sized frying pan.

You need:
600g flour (I used high quality Greek LIMNOS flour - this yellowish flour has a grainy texture; it's a joy to work with)
1/2 cup (approximately) of water
a teaspoon of salt

Place the water in a bowl and mix in the salt. Add a cup of flour and mix it in till well blended with a wooden spoon. This is the way I usually make filo pastry, not being a great fan of exact measurements of flour and water, which are always subject to temperature differences and flour quality. Now add another cup of flour and mix it in well. Keep adding flour until you can no longer mix it with a spoon. Start kneading the dough in the bowl, adding just enough flour to stop it from being sticky. Tip the dough onto a flat surface and knead it till it is soft and pliable. Set aside for an hour or two in a bowl, covered with a cotton cloth.

Divide the dough into 50-60g balls. Roll out each ball into a round, with the help of a rolling pin. Sprinkle with flour as you pile up the circles one on top of the other, to prevent them from sticking to each other.

Tradtionally, the perek are cooked on a very hot iron plate, like a griddle, in the fireplace. I cooked each one on both sides in a frying pan over a very hot flame. They felt soft when they came out of the fire, but when I wanted to use them (later in the afternoon), they were very crisp and dry.

Perek filo can be used in various ways (as in the original link I first noticed, and in Kiria Martha's pies in the taverna - see first photo for links). I made a spanakopita filling and chose to use the perek as a kind of wrap. Each perek was dampened in water to soften it, and wrapped around 3 tablespoons of filling. The pieces were placed in a pie dish and brushed liberally with olive oil. They were then baked in the oven till the pastry became crispy.

Next time I make perek, I will use the taverna photos as a guide to novel ideas for their use.

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Broccolopita (Μπροκολόπιτα)

Upon hearing the word 'pita', a Greek will immediately put a picture in their mind of filo pastry and some kind of cheese-based filling, with or without greens, or possibly containing grated squash. Broccoli won't commonly be one of the filling ingredients, but since I have run out of spinach and squash for the time being, and there is a lot of broccoli at the moment and not much else growing in the garden, I thought I'd try making a broccoli pie.

My first attempt picked up on a Betty Crocker recipe, which included chicken and was self-crusting. It was a very tasty pie, but nothing like a filo-pastry pita filled that I usually make. The pie was a self-crusting one, so it felt rather like eating a slice of bread rather than a pie (you could practically butter the slices).

Broccoli is not really so tasty on its own - it feels like you are eating grassy water. It needs fat, like oil or butter. If you add some egg and cheese to it, you get a more delicious taste. By adding some onion to this basic mixture, you get something that smells and tastes like a leek pie: prasopita (leek pie) is a very popular kind of Greek pita. Using this idea, I made a broccoli pita, in the same way that I make spanakopita: layers of pastry are spread with a thick filling dotted over the pastry sheet, then covered by more pastry, with another layer of filling, and finally topped with more pastry.

The pie was cooked in the oven compartment of our wood-fire heater, which made the pie even more tasty, as the pastry was well browned, both the top and the bottom. This is important because soggy pastry ruins pies. To ensure that the filling wasn't too moist (broccoli contains a lot of water), I added a small amount of dried breadcrumbs, just to ensure that any excess liquid would be absorbed. The broccoli was cooked for 5 minutes in boiling water, then drained and cut up into small pieces, which were mixed with some ricotta cheese (a novel imported product in Cretan supermarkets, which I had bought to try, as I have never had ricotta before - I usually use the local Cretan mizithra), some finely chopped onion, an egg, salt and pepper. This pie was made with some store-bought filo pastry which I wanted to use up, as it was showing signs of cracking due to dryness (you can see this in the photo). I normally make my own - it is so much tastier and has better texture.

I had a small bowlful of filling left over from the pie making session, so the next day, I made a rough dough and shaped it into seamless pies, similar to what is known as sfakiani pita in Crete. A ball of dough is rolled out thickly and a ball of filling is placed inside it. The dough is stretched to cover the filling, like a ball, and it is sealed on the top, rather like a pouch. This ball is pressed down lightly so that it doesn't break, and is rolled out into a flat pie which looks like a thick pancake. These flat pies are then pan-fried on each side in a shallow frying pan, in a little olive oil, until the pastry is golden-brown.

I regret not adding some parsely or mint to the filling - when I'm experimenting, I tend to use the bare basic ingredients and forget to add the touch of spice that often turns a basic meal into a taste experience. But each pita was also very good in its own way; the pastry pie was excellent and very similar to my regular pita recipes (it was creamier, and the pan-fried pies were also a success, especially when accompanied by a little sriracha sauce to add a little more flavour.

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Frugal chicken and broccoli pie

The broccoli season is now in full swing in our garden. I cut no less than 8 perfect heads of broccoli from the garden at the weekend, and chopped them into perfect florets before puting them in the freezer. Having just used up the very last of our frozen spinach from the previous season in a spanakopita the other day, I felt that the broccoli made up for its loss.

Here's my first broccoli meal for the season, from a Betty Crocker recipe for self-crusting broccoli and chicken pie.

I didn't add more grated cheese on top of the pie - there's more than enough protein in it already.

We don't have Bisquick in Crete (or maybe we do at AB supermarket, where all foreign tastes and imported Western staples seem to be found), so I made a substitute, as stated on this wikihow site. My pie is not gluten-free, as stated in the original recipe.

The recipe yielded a medium sized pie (about 6 pieces) and 3 muffin sized pies.

There was some mixture left over, so I also got three muffin-sized pies, made in separate ramekins. With all the specials going these days on chicken, eggs and cheese at various discount supermarkets, this was turned into an incredibly frugal meal to make. It was also very easy to whip up for an evening meal.

Because I was in a bit of a rush, I stuck to the original recipe. But if I make this again, I would add a spicy agent to jazz up the taste. I had my piece with some sriracha sauce to go with it, for some extra spunk.

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Spanakopita (Σπανακόπιτα)

Making a Greek pita is, for me, a mindless task. Rolling out pastry is not a mental chore, it's a physical one. So while I'm rolling out my pastry, I have much time to think and organise my thoughts. To make the task more challenging for me, I try to invent a new design to score the pastry.

Apart from a design I learnt from a youtube video...

and the classic square-shaped pieces...

I also do one of my own designs, which I call 'marigold':


Cooking can sometimes be mundane, but you can make it more exciting in your own way.  However I decide to score the pastry, I don't worry about it breaking - it still sits nicely on the top of the pie, and it was going to break anyway once it is served. 

I make a pita every week in the winter. This week's pita contained spinach and soft white cheese. It was made in a square-shaped baking vessel - for a change. I always make layered pastry pies - so my filling is never one layer - it's usually 2-3 layers, with pastry in between. Square pies are easier to deal with when you use store-bought pastry.

You need: a
500-600g finely cut spinach (I used spinach frozen from last spring to make the pita in the photo)
1 large onion, finely chopped
2-3 sprigs of finely minced fresh mint (or a teaspoon of dried mint)
500g Cretan mizithra or crumbled feta (I use mizithra because it's cheaper and possibly tastier)
1 egg
3-4 tablespoons of breadcrumbs (to ensure that any moisture in the filling is soaked up and won't make the pastry soggy)
salt and pepper (don't use too much salt if you use feta cheese)
10 sheets of filo pastry (I make my own filo pastry, which is a little thicker, therefore I use fewer sheets, about 8)
olive oil for brushing over the pastry

Thaw your pastry first (if you are using store-bought pastry). Mix all the filling ingredients together. (If you are making your own pastry, you should have the filling ingredients ready first. Then roll out one sheet at a time and use it immediately.) Turn on your oven to pre-heat to 200C.
Layer 1: Grease the bottom of a baking vessel (pyrex or tin). Place one sheet of pastry on it. (This piece of pastry should hang slightly over the sides of the baking vessel so that it will seal the pie at the end. In my photo, you will see that I didn't do this perfectly, but I use my own home-made filo pastry which is sturdier than store-bought pastry.) Grease the pastry and lay another sheet over it (do this twice). Dot a third of the filling evenly over the pastry. 
Layer 2: Lay another sheet of pastry over the filling. Press it down to make the filling spread evenly below the pastry. Grease the pastry and lay another sheet over it. Dot another third of the filling over the pastry. 
Layer 3: Repeat the instructions for Layer 2. Grease the pastry and lay another sheet over it (do this twice). Brush the final layer of pastry with olive oil, then turn the pastry hanging over the sides of the baking vessel over the top layer of the pie. Brush those with olive oil too. Then score the pastry with a knife, making cuts right down to the bottom of the baking tray, to make the cuts you want when you finally serve the pie.

You can see each layer of filling and the pastry layers.

Place the pie on the lowest shelf of your oven. Turn on the 'fan' function, which circulates the air all around oven. Turn down the temperature to 180C. Cook the pie for 40-50 minutes, depending on how golden you want the pastry. The fan function is important, so that you do not get soggy pastry at the bottom of the pie. If you do not have a fan function in your oven, cook it at 200C for at least an hour. Some ovens also have a function that allows them to cook using only the bottom heating elements. You can use this at high heat for 10 minutes or so, at the end of baking time. Allow the pie to cool for 10 minutes outside the oven before serving - you will need to cut again wth the knife to ensure that each piece comes out separately.

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Camera tricks

My pocket camera broke down, after taking about 10,000 shots in total. It's something I cannot do without. The photos that I take on it do not necessarily reflect great skill, but they often act as a kind of diary for me, a record of what has passed before my eyes.

Watercolours - winter is on its way.

So I went along to the public.gr store, which I must admit I am rather fond of. It's big, modern, breezy, it sells all sorts of electronics gear, computers and gadgets, and it also contains a large media section, where you can browse CDs, DVDs and books (the latter are rather over-priced) in both the English and Greek languages. Many of the books are sold in both languages, a very wise move of course - in Crete, especially since it is a tourist area, the English language is used in all sectors, and people's language skills are now good enough to buy and read English books. We also have an ex-pat community and public.gr also sells touristy items, so there is something for everyone in there.

Modern emphasis - keeping young.

I wanted to buy pretty much the same camera that I was already using: a Sony Cybershot, which I found selling for 79 euro; theoretically, I would be able to use the old battery pack, with a spare for the just-in-case moments. So I asked the assistant to give me one. Unfortunately, they were out of them, as they were a very popular and well-priced model. The next cheapest Sony was 159 euro - twice the price. I decided to take the plunge. When your camera is your diary, you really cannot wait for a cheaper model to be delivered to you from an online store.

Cartoon effects - child's play.

Our first proper photos were taken last night when I made the first pita for the season: home-made pastry (flour, water, olive oil and salt) filled with crumbled feta cheese, grated (2-month-old, overgrown) zucchini and egg, seasoned salt and pepper. Nothing else was added - that was a very simple pie. My daughter helped me to roll out half the filo sheets.

Black and white - the retro effect.

"What's that amazingly good smell coming from the kitchen?" my son asked, as he came indoors after helping his dad lay some manure over the soil. That kind of observation is hard to capture in a photo.

What you see is what you get - delicious.

You'll just have to take my word for it.

I'm glad I overspent on the new camera - its new features include capturing the mood of the moment.

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Melitzanopita - Eggplant pie (Μελιτζανόπιτα)

I was buying some (French) beef the other day, which I asked to be turned into mince. The woman at the supermarket counter asked me what I was going to make.

"Bifteki for the freezer," I told her, "and I will also leave some to make a makaronada for tomorrow's lunch."

"If you have some cooked mince left over," she said to me, "use it in a melitzanopita." She explained that aubergine/eggplant pie was her favorite pita. Her mother in law introduced her to it recently, making it into a large pie (made with filo pastry) which she served up as a main meal with salad, as well as on a buffet table for a party. These days, her daughter in law makes it into little pies enclosed in thick pastry (made with puff pastry sheets) and she takes them to the beach as part of a picnic lunch. "They freeze really well, too," she added.

I'd never made eggplant pie before, although I have heard of eggplant used in similar ways, eg vegetarian patties and fritters. Looking it up in my Greek cookbooks, I came across a couple of recipes for eggplant pie, made by some famous old-school Greek TV chefs. They were labelled plainly - melitzanopita - but neither used mince in the recipe: they both used dairy products (cheese and cream). One version (1990) - made by Ilias Mamalakis, who stated that the recipe was given to him by Dimitris Bliziotis, a Greek food historian - was made into a large pie while the other (1999) - made by Vefa Alexiadou (no history of the origin is mentioned) was made into individual fat cigars. Both versions used different thicknesses of Greek filo pastry and the recipes were very frugal in nature, with a clear focus on simple Greek flavours. Ilia's pie contained just coriander seeds to flavour it, while Vefa's used parsley and mint. The basic idea was to make an eggplant filling for a simple pastry casing, which could be rolled up in any way that the cook felt like making them.

Ilias' (left) and Vefa's (right) melitzanopita recipes

I thought this sounded like a nice novel way to use up the eggplant that is rolling into the house from our summer garden at the moment. It also sounded like something I would really like to make - when we hear of a new kind of food, we are open to it as long as it suits our taste spectra. Before looking up 'melitzanopita' (or 'eggplant pie', 'aubergine pie' etc) on the web - my first stop for anything that I don't know these days - I decided that it had to be a very Mediterranean taste combination, something that decidedly fits into the Greek taste spectrum. Melitzanopita sounds unusual, but the ingredients needed to make it are actually very common. Although the pie is not a well known Greek recipe, I bet that it must have been tried out at the very least on one of those morning TV shows that housewives watch, which screen while I'm at work. (By the time I come home, old Greek re-runs are playing, and then it's Turkish soap opera extravaganza time, as Greece can no longer afford to make her own.)

Sure enough, I came across a number of youtube videos from the private Greek TV channels, which often contain a mixture of make-you-feel-good topics for ladies of no particular occupation: a bit of fashion, some celeb gossip, a recipe by a home cook, with the show being hosted by strappy-dressed peroxide blondes. This kind of light-entertainment program features on most of the private channels, unlike the former Greek state broadcaster, still doing a pirate run on ebu.ch, which is now featuring no entertainment, and only political discussions, operatic music and other very politico-socio-cultural  formal types of Greek-style urban-context amusement. (I am hard pressed to understand if the operatic bits are what rural Greeks expected to suddenly be bombarded with on the pirate ERT - then again, they probably don't use internet to watch anything, ergo... pirate ERT is broadcasting not for the masses, but the minority. And let's not talk about the new public but not-quite-legal broadcaster that hit Greek TV screens a couple of weeks ago - it's quite simply an embarrassment.)

Vegetarian filling for melitzanopita

The melitzanopita was made into what looked like a delicious vegetarian pie using soft white cheese and home-made pastry (ALPHA -  June 2012). Admittedly, Vasilis Kalilidis made a really hash job of his pastry, but as I mention on my blog how trivial it is to worry about how perfect your filo pastry sheets come out: when you cut it, it's gonna get scrappy anyway, so the most important thing about making pastry is that your pie remains in one piece after it's cooked and you are serving it, whether on the plate or as finger food.

Melitzanopita with mince cooked eggplant and mince (made in the same way as for makaronada) 

The next link I found came from - yet again - another TV morning show recipe featured on the web, only a week after the previous one (ANT1 - 12 June 2012). Argiro Barbaridou's melitzanopita did contain mince, but it was quite a 'heavy' recipe: it also contained eggs and cheese, which didn't entice me to make it, as I prefer my pies simpler. Eggs, cheese, mince and eggplant, covered in carb-filled pastry, all in one dish reminds me of very rich meals like moussaka, which are better eaten during the winter in colder weather.

But the chef who started this eggplant pie craze appeared a whole month before the vegetarian and meat version (SKAI - 8 May 2012) - George Gounaridis' melitzanopita is vegetarian (it contains cheese). That's what I love about cooking - making the same food in different ways, to satisfy different tastes. The well known restauranteur made his own thin (perfect) filo pastry which he layered into a baking tin with a simple filling of cooked eggplant, tomatoes and onions. The finished pie looked very light and very appetising.

Don't worry about how scrappy your pastry looks; it'll break up easily at any rate once it's cooked.

So you get the picture: eggplant pie can be made any way you want - vegetarian or with meat, even vegan, with the addition of perhaps a binding agent (eg breadcrumbs, semolina or crushed nuts). The pastry can be home made or store bought, in any thickness. But the most important aspect is to make sure that the eggplant is prepared in some way before adding it to the pie. Either it is cooked in cubes, or it is cooked whole and the skin is scraped away before being used for the filling. Eggplant is one of those vegetables that needs a lot of olive oil to cook well enough not to taste like cardboard (which is probably why Gwyneth Paltrow doesn't like eggplant). To avoid the oil, it needs to be roasted. Either way, it needs some preparation time before being used in meals such as pies.

I decided to make my melitzanopita in the shape of a 'snail pie.'

After deciding what kind of filling you want, and what kind of filo pastry you will end up using, you can then choose which shape of pita to use. Whether you make a large pie to cut into pieces, or you make individual pies is up to you. I decided to make my melitzanopita into 'snail pies' - an idea I found from yet another recent melitzanopita recipe from a well known Greek TV chef (no date is given for Dina Nikolaou's pie, but I suspect it was as recently as 1-2 years) - as I really like shaping filo in this way, and it cuts up nicely into smaller pieces, for good portion control.

Sarikopita, Strifti, Kihi - they are all names for a round pie made up of pieces of filled pastry made in the shape of a snail's shell. 

While there is no shortage of melitzanopita recipes in Greek, eggplant pie is found in just a few non-Greek recipes. I have heard that Martha Stewart has some kind of Greek background, so I wonder if it was this aspect of her identity that drove her to make individual eggplant cheese pies in 2010. I think her vegetarian muffin-shaped melitzanopitakia look dreamy. Her recipe is not far off the one I used: I added strained cubed tomato, I didn't use coriander and I used crushed walnuts instead of pistachios. Crushed nuts are a great addition to pie fillings because they give pies an added texture, the nuts soak up excess liquids in a filling (the same job breadcrumbs and rice do) which often makes pastry soggy, and nuts act like protein in a vegetarian dish. The walnuts also had a sweetening effect on the eggplant, which can sometimes taste bitter, depending on the quality of the eggplant.

The cooked pies - vegetarian (top) and mince (bottom) melitzanopita

The important thing in an eggplant pie is not so much what you add to the filling, as much as the texture of the final filling. The creamier and firmer, the better, because it's easier to work with, and it cooks better. The fillings should be pre-cooked before being added to the pastry. I used Dina Nikolaou's recipe to make my vegetarian melitzanopita, while for the mince version, I simply fried some small cubes of eggplant in olive oil, drained them and then added them to some leftover makaronada mince. That constituted my meat-eggplant filling. Both pies worked well because the eggplant was paired with classic Mediterranean tastes. It all depends on what you want to make, how you want to make it, and the desired finished look of the pie.

Vegan melitzanopita for the 2nd Symposium: Food, Memory and Identity in Greece and the Diaspora taking place this weekend. The filling contains the same ingredients as the Gounaridis pita without the cheese; instead, I added some green peppers (with the onion), and a mixture of breadcrumbs and walnuts to bind the (cooked pureed) filling. It smells like mince - very cheap, very Greek and very frugal (the whole thing can't have cost me more than €1.50 to make - all the ingredients are found in most Cretan homes, and half would come from a small summer garden).

Melitzanopita, as it is made by Greeks, from the recipes available on the web, fits well within the taste spectrum of Greek food, using commonly associated combinations in Greek cuisine: eggplant and mince or eggplant and tomato, spiced up with parsley and mint, dressed in olive oil and encased in classic Greek filo pastry. It is an aromatic pie and makes a full meal, coupled with a green salad and some wine. More importantly, it's not an acquired taste and it is very versatile; these two aspects will make it popular among a wide variety of people.

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