Greek Hash - Home Cooked Recipe #78

I may have mentioned previously that I love Greek food, but in case you missed it, I REALLY love Greek food! I came up with this dish that I call Greek Hash. It is inspired by a dish at my favorite Greek restaurant in Tarpon Springs, FL called Greek chow mein, but with my own twists that are easy to prepare at home. I serve the hash with my tzatziki, and you can find that receipe HERE. It is an easy weeknight meal that is savory and delicious.

Greek Hash

Ingredients:

• 1 lb ground beef
• 1 bag Simply Potatoes shredded hash browns
• 8oz crumbled Feta
• 1 onion, diced
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 tbs Greek seasoning (I use one I get shipped in from NY, but they do have brands in the spice aisle of the grocery store)
• ***optional: roasted red peppers, sundried tomatoes, olives

Directions:  
In one pan brown ground beef. In a separate pan, Cook hash browns as package directs, along with onion and salt & pepper. Once beef and hash browns are fully cooked, combine together and Greek spice.  Toss in half of Feta, and any additional options as desired.  Plate and top with remaining Feta.  Serve with tzatziki.  Enjoy!

Tzatziki - Home Cooked Recipe #70

I have loved Greek food ever since I can remember.  I remember growing up in upstate NY and my favorite restaurant was Symeon's, a delicious Greek place.  My mom used to buy their house seasoning and make us chicken with it, and then make her homemade tzatziki.  A few years ago I looked up the restaurant online and found I could have the seasoning shipped here to FL.  For mother's day I shipped my mom a jar.  And I shipped one for myself!  Thinking about these food memories, I decided to come up with my own homemade Tzatziki recipe.  If you don't know what that is, it is a creamy cucumber dip.  It is delicious as a dip for veggies or pita bread, and it is even more tasty drizzled over Greek seasoned chicken (or pork, or beef, or lamb!).  It's healthier than a mayo or sour cream based dip. Easy to make, try it soon!


Tzatziki

Ingredients:

• 16 oz plain Greek yogurt
• 1 tablespoon sour cream
• 1 cucumber, peeled and seeded
• 1 teaspoon dried dill (or 1 tablespoon fresh, finely chopped)
• 1 garlic clove, finely minced
• salt and fresh ground black pepper
• ***optional - squeeze of fresh lemon juice, or lemon zest, or mint, finely chopped

Directions:
Grate cucumber.  Place in cheesecloth (or dish towel) in fine mesh sieve and squeeze out extra moisture.  Stir together yogurt and sour cream.  Add in minced garlic and and dill.  Fold in grated and drained cucumber.  Season with salt and pepper.  Serve with veggies, pita, chicken, or gyro meat.
Enjoy!

Spanikopita - Home Cooked Recipe 57

Aaaaaahhh.  Spinach pie.  One of my absolute favorite dishes in the world. A Greek delicacy, laced with many flaky phyllo dough layers, tons of butter, spinach, and cheese.  What is not to like?  Recently I wrote about my trip to the Epcot Food and Wine fest, and mentioned how their Spanikopita was my favorite bite.  It inspired me to make my own at home.  This recipe is easy, but does require patience.  Serious patience.  Phyllo dough is delicate and you have to layer it with butter on each sheet to get a nice base.  And this requires many sheets.  But in my opinion? Totally worth the effort.  And once you get the technique down you could fill your phyllo with anything you like!

Spanikopita

Ingredients:
2 10oz boxes of frozen spinach, thawed and drained (make sure you wring spinach out in a towel)
1 roll of phyllo dough (1/2 a box, a box usually comes with 2 rolls)
1 stick of butter, melted
1 4oz tub of feta
4oz shredded mozzarella
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 tsp dried dill
salt and pepper
dash of garlic powder

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350.
For the filling: Combine egg, spinach, cheeses, and spices.  Keep in fridge until done with first half of phyllo crust.
For the crust: Start by spreading out phyllo dough.  Divide stack in half, keeping one half under a moist (but not WET towel).  In a well-greased baking dish (9x9), place one sheet of phyllo.  Brush on butter.  Place another phyllo sheet on top.  Repeat phyllo layers until your first half of the roll is gone. Then layer on spinach filling, spreading evenly.  Remove moist towel and place a phyllo sheet on top of spinach.  Brush with butter.  Top with phyllo.  Repeat with the rest of phyllo dough until all sheets are used.  Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.
Enjoy!

Simply Sides 8 - Dolmas

What is a dolma you might be asking yourself?  Why it is a tasty little morsel!  More specifically, a dolma is a stuffed fruit or vegetable, i.e. stuffed cabbage leaves, zucchini, tomato, or in this case, grape leaves.  A middle Eastern dish, stuffed grape leaves are DELICIOUS, although they may sound weird to those who aren't so familiar with this culinary delight.  You can commonly find dolmades on Greek menus, and as my parents were fond of Greek food while I was growing up, I have had quite a few of these in my lifetime.  

Grape leaves are stuffed with a ground beef (or lamb) and rice mixture, with a brightness from lemons and a kick from various spices.  

I have never made dolmades before, and as I am expanding my culinary prowess this year, I thought I would give it a go.  To kick it up a notch, I developed a crock pot recipe for them, so once you've assembled them, you can just set it and forget them for a few hours!

These are great for parties, make a great appetizer, and are a great (fairly healthy snack).  I hope you give them a try!

Dolmas

Ingredients:

• 1 8oz jar grape leaves (found in the olive/pickle section of your grocery store)
• 1 lb ground beef (or lamb), browned with a diced onion
• 2 lemons
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 - 2 cups of chicken broth (or beef broth or veggie broth)
• 1 cup white rice, cooked
• 1/2 bunch fresh parsley, chopped fine
• 5 fresh mint leaves, chopped fine
• 1 tbs dried dill
• 1 tsp red pepper flakes
• salt and pepper (to taste, about 1 tsp of each)
• 1 onion, sliced

Directions:

Place sliced onion in the bottom of your crock pot.

In a large bowl, combine ground beef, rice, beaten egg, parsley, mint, dill, red pepper, salt, and pepper.  Mix well.  Add in the juice of 1 lemon, mix well.  Drain and rinse grape leaves.  Take 1 grape leaf, place some of the beef/rice mixture in the middle.  Fold in the short sides, fold over one of the long sides and roll.  Place seam side down on top of onion in crock pot.  Repeat with remaining grape leaves until ground beef mixture and/or grape leaves are gone.  

Mix broth and lemon juice together.  Pour over stuffed grape leaves in slow cooker.  Turn slow cooker to low and cook 6-8 hours or place slow cooker on high and cook 2-3 hours.

Enjoy!!!

Athena Cafe - Restaurant Review 6

Greek cuisine is by far one of my favorites.  I have always been drawn to Mediterranean flavors; olives, oregano, feta cheese, lemons... These are a few of my favorite things.  I adore pita, and the combination of cucumbers and tomatoes.  Greek yogurt is versatile and the base of one of my favorite sauces.  I am constantly on the hunt for new Greek restaurants.
Last week I was in the mood for a Gyro, and I also wanted to try a new place.  I have some great apps on my iPhone that help me find restaurants in the area, complete with pictures, recommended dishes, and directions.  Using this technology I was able to find Athena Cafe, located in Altamonte Springs, FL.  There were some very good reviews posted online, so off I went.
I was warmly greeted, and I thought the service was fast, and friendly.  My waitress, Crystal, was on top of things, and gave me ample time to peruse the menu but what was ready to take my order as soon as I decided.  I ended up choosing one of their dinner combos, which in my case was a traditional gyro with a Greek side salad.
My salad came out first.  It had fresh romaine, white onion, tomatoes, bell peppers, pepperoncinis, olives, feta cheese, and the best thing ever about Greek salads, potato salad.  It may sound odd to have potato salad with a green salad but there is something about the combination that is absolutely magical.  The only ingredients missing that would have completed this for me would have been beets and chickpeas, which are in my favorite Greek salad ever at Mr. Souvlaki in Tarpon Springs, FL.  The great thing about the salad here at Athena Cafe was that every table had a bottle of the dressing.  To me this is great, because you can put as much or as little as you like.
My gyro came out next.  I am picky when it comes to my gyros, traditionally they come on a fresh warm pita with meat, sauce, onions, and tomatoes, and some places also add lettuce.  I prefer my gyro with only the meat and sauce, sometimes with onion as well.  On this visit I did opt for onions to be added to my meat and sauce.  By the way, the meat on gyros is traditionally a lamb and beef mixture, cooked on a spit and then the meat is shaved off.  Yum!  My gyro was good, but not great.  I would leave off the onion next time, because it was in big chunks which is not my favorite thing.  Also, the meat seemed to be one of those prepackaged gyro meats as opposed to the fresh, just shaved off the spit meat I adore at Mr, Souvlaki.  But the pita on the sandwich was delicious, and I did enjoy the tzatziki (the traditional cucumber yogurt sauce).  
Overall, my experience at Athena Cafe was a decent one.  The food was good (although next time I'm hoping for something a little better, I'll probably try a new dish), the service was excellent, the prices were reasonable, and I thought the restaurant was clean and bright.