Main Course

Greek Pasta with Mizithra Cheese and Cherry Tomatoes

Hilopites with dry mizithra

Pasta is considered a comfort food for most. It is also a favorite among almost everyone, especially kids. Many people associate the Mediterranean diet with plenty of pasta and assume that this type of diet will make them fat. Well, first of all looking at the traditional Mediterranean diet, pasta was not consumed in large amounts. In the Greek traditional diet pasta was perhaps consumed once a week while in Italy pasta is often consumed in small amount as a first course. And let’s not forget that the rest of meal was rich in vegetables. So no the Mediterranean diet is not about eating large bowls of pasta everyday.

I occasionally make pasta adding several vegetables and cheese. My favorite type of cheese to add to pasta that also reminds me of my childhood meals with both my grandmothers is dry Mizithra or aged mizithra. Aged mizithra is basically made from the leftover whey from the milk. Usually from sheep or goat milk. It is a spicy, salty and hard cheese ideal for grating. Apart from the flavor, it is generally a lower fat cheese, which means you can add a bit more and not worry about it too much. Brands that are exported are often made with less fat, some companies add cream. I have found a dry mizithra here in Greece with very little fat but with a lot of taste. Also dry mizithra is not to be confused with fresh mizithra. Fresh mizithra tastes different, and has a different texture as well. It is almost sweet and soft similar to ricotta. Read more »

Greek Style Roasted Anchovies

roasted anchovy

This may simply be one of the healthiest meals you will ever eat. There is not one ingredient in this recipe that is not good for you. Everything in this dish will not only benefit your body but will make your taste buds happy too! Starting with the anchovies, which are an excellent source of the hard to find omega-3 fatty acids that may protect from stroke and from inflammation, and they are also a healthy source of protein. The anchovies are blended with a mixture of onions, garlic, oregano and olive oil. All these ingredients are excellent sources of antioxidants while the olive oil gives us an additional boost of the good monounsaturated fats that can help lower bad cholesterol.

With all this discussion about whether the moderate fat Mediterranean diet is better then a low fat diet, I will note that this is not a low fat dish. Over 50% of calories come from fat. But before you start panicking, let’s see what that fat is. Read more »

One Pot Greek Chicken with Kritharaki (Orzo) and Tomato

SAMSUNG CSC

This is an easy version of the classic dish Giouvetsi. It is a dish of meat (usually lamb or veal) accompanied by some sort of pasta and cooked in the oven. It was often made on Sundays, to be eaten after church. Well you might wonder, who stayed at home watching the oven? Nobody. Years ago not everybody had an oven in their home and so they prepared the meal/recipe in a large pan and took it over to their local bakery (fourno) to be cooked. I remember as a child when I was staying at my grandmother’s, my sister and I would pick up our meal from the fourno for lunch. Each customer had their last name written on their pan so that there were no mix ups and when 1 o’clock approached, our baker had our meal cooked to perfection and ready to be picked up.

Now this is a quick and easy version and not really a giouvetsi as I have basically cooked it in a pot and not in the oven, but the ingredients are same and because it is so easy, you can even make it on a weeknight. This is a comfort food, but when you really don’t have time to spend cooking a big meal in the oven, this one pot, lighter version will do the trick. Read more »

Briami (The Greek Ratatouille)

I don’t like to describe a dish using the name of a dish of another culture, but if you ask someone (who is not Greek) what briami is they willl probably just give you a blank look. If you ask them what ratatouille is, well… there are more possibilities that they will know that it’s not just a cartoon.

So today is briami or briam day. This is another summer favorite, although I have to admit, I also make it during other seasons without eggplant. Briami is basically chunks of vegetables cooked in olive oil, and it belongs to the lathera family. But you don’t just add any vegetable you want, there are certain vegetables that make up briami: potatoes, zucchini, eggplant, onion, tomato, sometimes okra and bell pepper. You can make briami in a pot just like you would make ….let’s say fasolakia lathera (green beans with tomato and olive oil), or in the oven which is how I like it. With the roasted version, the vegetables become crispy and in combination with feta cheese and a fresh bread, this is a perfect meal. Read more »

Baked Eggplant with Feta Cheese and Olive Oil

My personal favorite way of eating eggplant is baked, combined with tomato, olive oil and feta. It is a simple, but flavorful recipe and I managed to make it lighter by lightly sautéing the eggplant and letting the eggplant slices strain on paper towels. Yes, you need to sauté them a bit, otherwise the skin will be hard, but leaving them on paper towels will help get rid of the excess oil. I also did not use too much olive oil in the baking dish, I just drizzled some on top of each slice as opposed to having the whole baking dish full of oil. Read on for the recipe Read more »

A Nutritionist’s favorite Mediterranean Summer Dish: Greek Stuffed Tomatoes-Gemista

It is not possible to talk about tomatoes, the Mediterranean diet and Greek food without mentioning Gemista. Gemista are vegetables usually tomatoes, bell peppers, zucchini and eggplant filled with rice (sometimes with ground meat) and baked in the oven. Gemista translates as “ones that are filled”. And as I mentioned earlier my mom’s gemista happen to be my favorite food.

As with most people’s favorite foods, this is also a comfort food for me, but as opposed to many comfort foods this one is healthy. At first glance you may think it’s a starchy dish, but once you take a look at this recipe you will notice that there are plenty of vegetables, to be exact, for each gemisto you eat you get almost 2 servings of vegetables. Why? Well the rice itself is mixed with some more vegetables; in fact you only eat about a ¼ cup of rice per serving.

Now I need to mention that yes, this recipe has a lot of olive oil for non-mediterranean standards, but don’t let that scare you. First of all there is plenty of olive oil left in the pan so unless you drink it or mop it up with bread you won’t be getting all those calories. Secondly, as I have mentioned the beauty of the lathera-Greek vegetarian dishes with moderate starch and a good amount is olive oil is that you actually end up with a moderate amount of calories because the vegetables hardly add any calories to the meal.

Now as I said my mom’s gemista is my favorite food, I don’t order gemista when I’m out because I don’t like them. Here is why these are the best… Read more »

Mediterranean Diet Month: Meat the Greek Way, Greek Burgers.

The Greek patty known as bifteki in Greek, was usually made from ground lamb meat and was considered a rare treat since meat was not necessarily consumed every day.

Greeks don’t make patties like Americans, they don’t eat plain ground meat, instead they add all sorts of ingredients to them such as oregano, spices, and olive oil.

Many Greeks consider the American style burger bland because it doesn’t have all these ingredients. I remember my mom making “hamburgers” for dinner and little did we know that they were actually biftekia served with ketchup, mustard and a hamburger bun. My mom refused to serve us plain ground meat.

But apart from making them tastier, these additions to the meat have other functions:

  • Since meat was expensive and scarce, stale bread and egg were added so that they could “stretch” the meat and make more servings.
  • The oregano, cumin, mint and olive oil that are added are all excellent sources of antioxidants that give a nutritional punch to your patty.
  • The herbs also reduce the levels of heterocyclic amines (HCAs), compounds that develop when meat is cooked at high temperatures and have been associated with certain types of cancer. So the good news is that if you rub or use dry herbs such as oregano and mint on the meat you can reduce the levels of these harmful compounds. Read on for the recipe  Read more »

Greek Egg Lemon (Avgolemono) Soup with Chicken, a comforting alternative to Mayiritsa

If you have been reading about the Greek Easter, you know by now that it’s a very food centered event. One of the most important meals is the one that breaks the long fast: the celebratory post midnight meal on the Saturday night before Easter, Greeks traditionally eat Mayiritsa, a soup made with lamb offal as the main course.

To me eating soup made from organ meats doesn’t sound too appetizing, and so for as long as I can remember, my mom would make an alternative soup; Egg Lemon Soup with chicken known as Soupa Avyolemono me Kota. Apart from having mayiritsa, the tradition is to have some sort of soup for this midnight meal, and so in our home we had this one.

Kids could eat it and it is pretty healthy. Made mainly with chicken and rice, the egg lemon soup only contains two eggs (for 4-6 servings) and there is no additional fat apart from the fat in the broth and the eggs. It is accompanied by carrots, so you get your vegetables too.

The word Avgolemono means Egg- Lemon and it is a preparation used with other types of meats and dishes… Read more »

Mediterranean Inspired Crustless Gluten-Free Quiche

Last Friday I appeared again on the Greek cooking show Chef On Air (Chef ston aera), this time to cook some gluten free recipes. (You can see it here, but it’s all in Greek)

My philosophy is that a healthy diet or a diet with certain dietary restrictions doesn’t have to be bland or boring, which is I why I believe cooking is so important.

So, I cooked 2 recipes that were Mediterranean inspired: plenty of vegetables and tomatoes and a dessert that was not so Mediterranean (flourless brownies).

One of my recipes, which I actually make often at home, even though I don’t avoid gluten, is the flourless spinach quiche. Having a French mother in law I have enjoyed her delicious quiches, but sometimes I do try to avoid the crust for the obvious reasons.

This crustless gluten free quiche has plenty of vegetables, some Greek cheese, milk and a bit of cream and eggs. Read more »

23 Interesting and Easy Ways to Eat Greek Yogurt

Now that we’ve established what Greek traditional yogurt is (from sheep’s milk), we can talk about the famous strained yogurt, or otherwise known as “Greek” style yogurt. So yes this yogurt is creamier and has more protein than your average cow’s milk yogurt, because it’s strained. It’s a great substitute for heavy cream, sour cream and generally can be filling, decadent and healthy all at the same time. So here are my 23 ways to add Greek style yogurt to your diet:

1. Combine the strained yogurt with beets, walnuts, garlic and olive oil to make a Greek style beet salad.

2. Replace some of the cream cheese in a no bake cheesecake with Greek style yogurt.

3. Use it in tacos, nachos and chili instead of sour cream.

4. Use it as dip with roasted meat. Greeks may serve pork, gyros or other spicy meats with a side of plain strained yogurt.

5. Make a chicken roasted in yogurt sauce. Add some herbs and spices to the yogurt and use it as a rub for roasted chicken.

6. Use Greek style yogurt with crumbled blue cheese for a healthier dip to accompany chicken wings.

7. Enjoy it in the place of milk with cereal or granola.

8. Replace some of the fat with yogurt in muffins and cakes.

9. Eat it with rice. Yogurt and rice was a favorite comfort food when I was a child, plus it’s a great combination of carbs and proteins.

10. Eat it the traditional Greek way: with honey and walnuts or add some homemade jam or Greek spoon sweets or fresh fruit

11. Make a light and airy mousse combining whipped cream and Greek style yogurt with a bit of sugar. Read more »