Collection
12 Greek Classics Every Cook Should Know
Twelve dishes that between them cover most of what a Greek kitchen does. Learn these and you can improvise the rest.
A short set of dishes that between them cover most of what a Greek kitchen does. Learn these and you can improvise the rest.
Each one teaches something that carries over. Moussaka teaches bechamel and layering. Spanakopita teaches phyllo, and how to get the water out of a filling. Avgolemono soup teaches the egg and lemon sauce. Baklava teaches syrup. Gemista teaches rice that goes in raw and cooks inside the vegetable. Fasolada teaches pulses. Souvlaki teaches the grill.
Horta, lemon potatoes, tzatziki and a Greek salad are what goes next to everything else. Cook your way down the list and you have the technique for most of the site.
Every recipe on Kalliopi's Kitchen carries the dish's Greek name and a pronunciation, its region where that is meaningful, ingredient quantities in both metric and imperial, and an honest note on what commonly goes wrong. Nutrition figures are calculated estimates and are labelled as such.
1. Moussaka
Mousakas · Μουσακάς · moo-sah-KAHS
When people say Greek food, this is usually what they mean, and it is also the dish that gets ruined most. Water does it, not bad ingredients. Cook the meat sauce drier than looks right and keep the bechamel thick. It is no weeknight dinner, but nearly all of it can be made ahead.
Yiayia’s tip: Salt the aubergines even if the packet says you do not need to. Modern aubergines are far less bitter than they used to be, so salting is often called unnecessary. That misses the point. Salting collapses the cell structure and drives out water, which means the slices absorb less oil and hold their shape in the bake.
Make Moussaka2. Tzatziki
Τζατζίκι · tsah-TSEE-kee
The gap between the real thing and the loose grey tubs in the shops has nothing to do with garlic. The cucumber is salted and squeezed dry, and the yogurt is strained, thick and tart. Low-fat yogurt turns chalky. The garlic should be loud, and the dip is better made a day ahead.
Yiayia’s tip: Do not use a food processor. It shreds the cucumber too finely and whips air into the yogurt, giving a slack, foamy texture. A box grater and a bowl are the right tools.
Make Tzatziki3. Greek Salad
Horiatiki salata · Χωριάτικη σαλάτα · hor-YAH-tee-kee sah-LAH-tah
Horiatiki means village salad: what was growing outside, chopped and oiled. There is no lettuce in it. The feta goes on top as one thick slab, never crumbled, and you break bits off as you eat. The dressing is olive oil, a splash of red wine vinegar, salt and oregano, straight into the bowl.
Yiayia’s tip: Room temperature, not fridge cold. Cold blunts tomato flavour badly. Take the tomatoes and feta out of the fridge half an hour before you build the salad.
Make Greek Salad4. Spanakopita
Σπανακόπιτα · spah-nah-KOH-pee-tah
Pies are the centre of Greek home baking, and this is the one that left the country. Greens and cheese in quantity, almost nothing else, inside pastry thin enough to read through. Every sheet has to be brushed with fat. Dry phyllo fuses into one papery slab, and the separate leaves are the point.
Yiayia’s tip: Squeeze harder than you think necessary. If any liquid at all comes out when you press the filling in the bowl, go back and squeeze again. This one step decides the pie.
Make Spanakopita5. Pork Souvlaki
Souvlaki · Σουβλάκι · soo-VLAH-kee
Little skewer is what the word means, and to a Greek it is the meat, not the wrap. Order one in Athens and two bare skewers may arrive with bread, lemon and raw onion. The meat is nearly always pork, and shoulder has the fat to survive a hard fire. Beef barely comes into it.
Yiayia’s tip: Leave gaps between the cubes. Meat packed tightly against itself on a skewer cannot brown on the touching faces. Small gaps let the fire get in and give you crust on all sides.
Make Pork Souvlaki6. Avgolemono Soup
Kotosoupa avgolemono · Κοτόσουπα αυγολέμονο · ahv-gho-LEH-mo-no
Avgo is egg and lemoni is lemon. Whisked together and loosened with hot broth, they thicken a soup with no flour and no cream. It is what a Greek kitchen makes when somebody has flu. The broth goes into the eggs one ladle at a time, away from the heat, or they scramble.
Yiayia’s tip: Room temperature eggs. Cold eggs hitting hot broth is a bigger temperature shock and a bigger curdling risk. Take them out of the fridge half an hour ahead.
Make Avgolemono Soup7. Baklava
Baklavas · Μπακλαβάς · bahk-lah-VAHS
The one everybody thinks they know. The Greek version is walnuts, not pistachios, with a heavy hand of cinnamon and clove and a syrup built on honey. Nothing in it is difficult. The layering takes as long as it takes, and the syrup decides whether you end up with crisp or soggy.
Yiayia’s tip: Do not stir the syrup once it boils. Stirring a boiling sugar syrup encourages crystallisation. Dissolve the sugar as it heats, then leave it alone.
Make Baklava8. Lemon Potatoes
Patates lemonates · Πατάτες λεμονάτες · pah-TAH-tes leh-mo-NAH-tes
Not roast potatoes with lemon squeezed over. They braise first and roast second, in one tin, with nothing done in between. The liquid looks like far too much. It steams them soft, then boils away and leaves them to colour in oil and concentrated lemon. Cut it back and the middles stay hard.
Yiayia’s tip: Do not crowd the tin. Two tins are better than one overloaded one. Potatoes piled on top of each other steam and never colour, however long you give them.
Make Lemon Potatoes9. Horta
Horta vrasta · Χόρτα βραστά · HOR-tah vrah-STAH
Nothing in Greek cooking is plainer, and it may be the most important thing in it: boiled greens with olive oil and lemon, eaten several times a week. Dandelion, chicory, amaranth and beet greens all go in the pot. They are cooked soft and drab, never bright green, because wild greens are tough and bitter.
Yiayia’s tip: Wash more than you think necessary. Grit in horta ruins it and is very hard to detect until you are eating. Lift the greens out of the water rather than tipping the whole lot into a colander.
Make Horta10. Gemista
Γεμιστά · yeh-mee-STAH
Stuffed tomatoes and peppers, and two rules govern them. The rice is raw when it goes in, and nothing is filled past two thirds, because rice cooked first goes to paste and a full tomato bursts. The potatoes wedged in the gaps catch the juices. Many Greeks think them the best thing in the tray.
Yiayia’s tip: Salt and drain the tomato shells. Ten minutes upside down removes excess water that would otherwise make the rice sloppy.
Make Gemista11. Keftedes
Κεφτέδες · kef-TEH-des
Lighter than most meatballs, and the bread does it: stale bread, wetted and wrung out, holds water inside where breadcrumbs would tighten the mix. They taste of mint and oregano, not garlic and parsley, which separates them from Italian polpette. More often a meze than a main, and good cold the next day.
Yiayia’s tip: Wet your hands to shape. Damp palms stop the mixture sticking and give a smoother surface that browns more evenly.
Make Keftedes12. Fasolada
Φασολάδα · fah-so-LAH-thah
Routinely called the national dish, and the claim holds up: for centuries, all over the country, this was what people ate several times a week. It is filling, costs little and is allowed in every fast. No stock goes in, only water. Too little olive oil or too little time, and it stays bean water.
Yiayia’s tip: Boil hard for five minutes first. The initial hard boil and change of water removes compounds that cause digestive discomfort and gives a cleaner-tasting soup.
Make Fasolada
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