Almonds

Almonds grow across Greece and Cyprus and flower early enough that the blossom is read as the first sign of spring. In the kitchen they do two quite separate jobs: ground fine, they stand in for much of the flour in a cake or a sweet, giving a dense, moist crumb that flour alone cannot; left whole or flaked, they provide the crunch in a syrup-soaked pastry or a festive loaf.

Amygdalota, the soft almond sweets associated with Hydra and several of the Cyclades, are little more than ground almonds, sugar and rose water, shaped by hand and buried in icing sugar. Kourabiedes carry toasted almonds through the dough, mandolato from Zakynthos sets them into a Venetian-style nougat, and tsoureki and vasilopita are both scattered with flaked almonds before they go into the oven.

Blanched almonds, with the skins slipped off after a minute in boiling water, are what the pale sweets ask for, since the skins leave brown flecks and a faint bitterness. Buy whole nuts and grind them as you need them: ready-ground almonds expose far more surface to the air and turn stale and faintly rancid within a few months of opening.