The history of your Favorite Foods: Pizza, Ice cream . . .

 So how do we track back in time to find the origins, the stories of how our favorite foods began?   Who put fortunes in cookies and tomato sauce on spaghetti?  Food pairings and cultural dishes have a long history.  From spice trades, to climate regions, culinary history continues to evolve.  Natural food traditions complement…

Baklava Recipe of Hellenic Cuisine Cook book – Detroit, MI

Follow my blog with Bloglovin It started with an urgent recipe book search, followed by a Whatsapp message to my mom, “Hey, I’m making baklava and was thinking about yiayia’s recipe book.  Did you give me a copy?” My Yiayia Christina was a legendary cook.  It’s a family fact that Yiayia and Thea Toula (her…

How to Cure your Own Olives in Brine: Greek Yiayia Style

Follow my blog with Bloglovin How to make your own olives edible. Mom would say, “Only eat 8 olives a day, honey.”  But it was too easy to devour the salty Grecian delights by the dozen. With crusty brown sourdough bread and green virgin olive oil on a flat side plate, nothing satisfied me more…

What to Eat when Visiting Greece’s villages: Nourishing Food Traditions

   Summertime and road tripping lead to some of my favorite food adventure memories.  In Greece, you can drive on national highways and come across Greek village tavernas that serve greek horiatiki salads under grapevines.  Roadside stalls are piled with local fresh, dried, and preserved food that have been made and celebrated for centuries.  Tradition, food…

To Cook or Dehydrate: Raw Food Recipes and Creativity

I just learned how to harvest Aloe Ferox from the ‘cook’ book Rawlicious-Recipes for Radiant Health.  It’s a recipe book that encourages you to make colourful and vibrant food by encouraging you to put aloe in your smoothies, have sprouts as a kitchen staple,  and make edible flower salads that look like birthday confetti.  Who…

The Perfect Beach Snack: Nutella Loukoumades (Donuts) in Parga, Greece

 You can’t get more indulgent than pouring Nutella over fried dough.  Well I wouldn’t mind adding fresh strawberries or crushed almonds into the mix.  Regardless, everyone around the world loves fried dough.  North Americans call it doughnuts, South Africans call it vetkoek, Greeks call it loukoumades.  But not everyone pours Nutella over it.  My friend…

Greek Glory: The Kebab Pita at Thanasis

I had a layover in Athens back in 2008. The first stop I made when I got out the airport was at Thanasi’s Greek kefta kebab pita joint.  I sat in the middle of Monastiraki square and savoured each bite.  The pita kebab filled my tastebuds with the celebrated spices that have influenced Greek cuisine…

Step by Step-Easy Dolmades Recipe (just like your Yiayia’s)

In less than a month, I’ll be back in Greece buying white peaches from my Yiayia’s (grandmother) neighbourhood laiki (produce market) and learning how to make feta cheese from the thea’s (Aunties) in the horio (village).  But lately I’ve been channeling my ancestors by consuming far too many olives and craving those cultural food comforts…