Preparation time: 5 minutes

cooking time: 30 minutes

difficulty: easy

Preparation:

Wash the rice. Boil one cup of rice with two cups of water on low heat. I usually heat up a small pot, add some butter, then the rice. Then I pour in the water stir and cover the pot. Now I turn off the heat completely and wait for 20 minutes. This only works with an old fashioned stove.

Wash and cut the zucchini into slices. Fry in a pan with butter. Season with cumin, salt and pepper.

Peel the pistachios and chop the almonds roughly. Toast them in a pan.

Soak the saffron in a little bit hot water.

Remove the seeds of the pomegranate and put them in to a bowl.

Fluff up the boiled rice with a fork. Season with some cinnamon. Pour the saffron over it and mix well.
Put into a bowl. Add the zucchini and the nuts. Season with salt, pepper, cinnamon and cumin. Put the pomegranate seeds on top and serve.

Preparation time: 30 minutes

easy recipe

Preparation:

Peel and cube the pumpkin. Make sure that the cubes are not too small. Rub the cubes with some olive oil, season them with salt and pepper and put them on a baking tray. Bake them for 20 minutes at 220 degrees in the oven. The pumpkin should still have a bite when you take it out of the oven.

Put the apricots into a bowl and soak them in hot water. When the pumpkin is done, remove from the water and cut into small cubes.

Slice the onions and fry them with some oil until they are brown.

Put the couscous into a bowl, season with the cinnamon and the saffron. Mix with the boiling soup, cover it and let it sit for 5 minutes.

Chop the parsley and the mint and put aside.

Remove the pumpkin cubes from the oven and put with the couscous. Add the mint, parsley, onions, and the apricots and mix well. Season with the lemon juice and zest, as well as with some olive oil, salt and pepper.

This recipe I found in a cookbook called “flavours of the mediterranean” which I had gotten form my almost mother in law for Christmas. Finally I had gotter arround to cooking from it. A great dish for eggplant lovers with a touch of anchovies. The eggplant slices are boiled as well before being fryed which prevents them form drawing lots of oil. This makes the dish very light.

Preparation time: 20 minutes

baking time: 15 minutes

easy recipe

Preparation:

Cut the eggplant along its long side into slices of half a finger. Boil the slice in water for 2 to 3 minutes, then place them in a drianer to loose some water. Now fry them in a pan with a little bit oil. You want them to get some nice colour.

Menawhile blend the onion in a mixer to a fine puree. Mix it in a bowl with some ground almonds, the egg, the olive paste, the tomato paste, the thzme and the oregano. Season with salt and pepper.

Lay the eggplant slice on a cutting board and spread the mix evenly onto it. Place an anchovy on one end of the slice and roll it up from this end. Stick a tooth pick into it to stabelize it and place into an oiled baking tray.

Repeat the last step until the eggplant and the filing is used up.

You can sprinkle some cheese over the dish if you wish.

Place in the oven and broil for 10 to 15 minutes at 180 degrees.

Baked beans and spinach is another fasting dish I want to present. This combination of beans and spinach surprised me with its taste and texture. The beans are melting, the spinache is jusicy. The onion and the garlic give a nice falvour to the vegetarian dish. In later posts I will also present some fish dishes that are part of the fasting tradition. Those dishes are rather the exeption, vegetarian food is the rule.

Preparation: 30 minutes & soaking the beans for a couple of hours

baking time: 30 minutes

very simple recipe

Preparation:

Soak the beans over night. You can also use canned ones. Peel the carrots, the onion and the celery. Cut the celery in stripes and put it with the carrots and the onion into a pot with water and bring to boil. Add the beans and boil them until soft. Drain the liquid but make sure you collect it when draining. Put the liquid aside. Take the carrots and cut them into small cubes. (in case you used canned beans, you do not need to boil them. Just boil the veggies for 15 – 20 minutes)

Take a large frying pan and add some olive oil. chop the onion and the garlic and fry both in the pan. Add the well washed spinach. Fry lightly while tossing it.

Spread the beans out in a casserols. Put a layer of spinach over it. Layer the boiled veggies over it (carrot and celery root). Then again a layer of beans, the a layer of spinach. The layering should end with a layer of spinach. Now season with salt and pepper. Finally poor some of the boiling water over the ingredients. Toss some flour over the dish and put the casserole into the oven. Bake at 200 degrees centigrade for 30 minuts. At the second half of the baking time I turn on the grill to give the dish some colour on top. Keep an eye on it though.

Before servinf sprinkle some good olive oil over the dish.

TIP: If you are not fasting you can add some Feta Cheese on top of the dish before putting it into the oven.

Beim Servieren mit gutem Olivenöl beträufeln.

Seven weeks befor Easter Lent beginns in Christianity. So with also here in Greece. For those who take fasting verz serious certain rules apply according to the day of the week and the week you are in. Some of the days vegan food is in demand, on other days the consumtion of oil, wine and molluscas are allowed. Other days again allow fish. I will get back with a more detailed explenation in a later post.

Quite a few people here in Greece follow the rules of Lent, event restaurants change their menu for those who want to fast.

I want to dedicate a few posts to the topic of fasting as I am fascinated by the fhought of cleansing your body and mind with sticking to certain foods.

I will start my series of fasting food with Melinzanokeftedes, a meatless burger made aout of eggplants.

The cheese on the photo would not be allowed if we were fasting already, but we sitll have some days to go before it all beginns.

Preparation time: 40 minutes

cooking time: 30 minutes

simple recipe

Preparation:

Bake the eggplants in the oven at 200 degrees centigrade. When they throw bubbles and you can poke them easily with a fork, they are done. Take them out of the oven and put them aside to cool off.

Soak the bread in some water. Squeeze it well and crumble it into a bowl. chop the ontions and fry them in a pan with some olive oil. Add the minced garlic. Fry for a couple of minutes, then add to the bowl.

Chop the mint and the parsley and add it to the bowl. Cut the eggplants in half and scoop out the meat. Cut the meat into cubes and add to the bowl.

Add a few spoons of flour and mix all ingredients well. Let the mixture rest for a couple of minutes.

Heat olive oil in a pan. take a table spoon and scoop some of the mixture into the pan. Spread the mixture in the pan until it has the size of a small burger. Repeat this step until you have a few burgers in the pan frying. Fry on medium heat, flip after a few minutes, when the bottom side has gotten crusty. Fry well on both sides.

I serve these vegetarian burgers with some Feta cheese.

Escaping the busy new year time in Athens I have escaped to Hydra. Here in the Saronic golf things are going slow and quiet. This is exactly what I was looking for. The weather is fabulous and I could enjoy lunch in a t-shirt. Being a chickpea lover I have prepared chickpeas with spinach. A delicious simple dish that tasted even better after all the rich Christmas food.

Preparation time: 15 minutes

soack chickpeas over night

cooking time: 15 minutes

very simple recipe

preparation:

Soak the chickpeas over night. Drain and then boil them. Boiling them for 15 minutes should do. You could also use canned chickpeas.

Wash the spinach well and chop it into pieces.

Cube the onions very fine and fry them in a pot with olive oil. Add the finely chopped garlic.

After a few minutes add the honey, salt and pepper. Add the spinach and fry for a few minutes. Now add the chickpeas, the lemon juice and some water. The ingredients should be just covered with liquid.

Simmer for 15 minutes.

Crush some chickpeas with a fork. The liquid will reduce and you will result with a thick sauce. The spinach will have become creamy.

TIP: Serve with a slice of Feta cheese.

The German Version of the recipe is here.

With the weather cooling down warm salads are more and more welcome. At this time of the year, I prefer a hearty, warm plate to a cold salad. This cauliflower salad con be served as a side dish, but it can serve as well as a whole meal, especially for lunch. I served it with crusty oven baked potatoes. The tomato in combination with the cumin and the garlic gives the dish a mediterranean flair.

Preparation time: 3 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
very simple recipe

Ingredients:

Preparation:

Skinn the tomatoe and cube it. You can also used canned tomatoes, depending on season and geography.

Fry the cubed onion in a bit of oil. Then add the chopped garlic. Stir and fry for a minute or two. Now add salt and pepper and saffron.

Now add the caulyflower and the tomato. Add a bit of water if needed. The vegetables should be just covered with liquid.

Cover the pot and let it boil for 15 minutes. Then let it boil for another 5 minutes without covering it in order to loose some liquid. The cauliflower should be done by now.

Place on a big serving plate and put lots of parsley over it. Ready to serve.

Spring onions in filo pastry (Μπουρεκάκι με κρεμμύδι)

This is an amazingly minimalistic recipe. The dish consists only of filo pastry and spring onions. Just some salt, pepper and olive oil added to season it. I serve it as a mezze with ouzo or wine but as well as a starter in combination with some salad. The soft onion in combination with the crusty pastry makes an ideal light snack.

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Baking time: 30 minutes
Easy recipe

Ingredients:

Preparation :

Wash and chop the scallions. Put them into a bowl, season with salt, pepper and some olive oil and mix well.
Take a leaf of the filo pastry and spread some olive oil over it. Add a second leaf and again spread some olive oil over it. Now put a third of the filling on one side of the pastry leafs. Roll the filo pastry up so it looks like a tube. Be careful with the openings of the filo. Make sure no filling is falling out while you roll it.

Once rolled, fold the filo at the openings to assure nothing is falling out while baking.

Repeat this until all the filling is used up.

Cut with a knife diagonally into pieces and put on top of a baking paper into the oven.

Bake for 30 minutes at 200 degrees centigrade.

Serve warm or cold.

The German version “Frühlingszwiebeln in Filo Teig” you can find here.

Fennel in the pan

I had some fennel left from the chicken dish I had prepared the other day. For my personal taste the best way to prepare fennel is to prepare it as simple as possible. This way it can develop its unique taste the best way possible.

Preparation time: 3 minutes
Cooking time: 25-30 minutes
Simple recipe

Ingredients :

Preparation:

Wash the fennel and cut it into quarters. Cut the green sprouts off and keep them for later.
Heat the oil in a frying pan and fry the fennel. Be careful the oil might spray!
Fry the fennel for 15-20 minutes until it gets a nice golden colour. Do not turn the fennel too often.
Add the chopped garlic and fry for an additional 3-5 minutes.
Now add a small cup of water. Let the dish boil for 5 minutes until most the water has evaporated.
Add some lemon juice to the dish. Season with salt and pepper. Chop the fennel greens fine and sprinkle over the dish.
Serve warm.

the german version of this recipe “Fenchel in der Pfanne” you can find here.

Rosmarinkartoffeln

I love this way of preparing potatoes. They become crusty from the outside while turning soft and mushy on the inside. They go well with meat and fish, but I often make them on their own and serve them with a sauce and some salad.

Preparation time: 5 minutes
Baking time: 30-45 minutes
Very simple

Ingredients:

Preparation:

Peel the potatoes and then cut them into quarters. Put them into a cassarole and pour the oil over them.It should cover the base of the cassarole. Sprinkle the salt and the rosemary on top.
Put them into a pre-heated oven at 220 degrees centigrade and let them bake for 30-45 minutes.

the German language version of this recipe you can find here…