BIANCO Makes 4 to 6 servings Another Corfiote fish recipe with an Italian-sounding name. Bianco is pungent with garlic and is called “white” because it is made without tomatoes. Ingredients: 2 tablespoons unsalted butter 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil 2 medium onions, halved and thinly sliced 8 to 10 garlic cloves, to taste, chopped 6 to 8 […]

HTAPOTHI CAPAMA TIS ITHAKIS Makes 4 servings The word capama comes from the Turkish for “to cover.” It is a name given to many different kinds of stew all around Greece. Sometimes it refers to beef or chicken dishes cooked with tomatoes and cinnamon, other times to simple ragouts. This capama includes celery. What is unusual about it is that […]

TIGANITO HTAPOTHAKI APO TIN ITHAKI Makes 8 to 10 meze servings Octopus is the Lenten fare par excellence in Ithaca. There is plenty of it, it is rich and filling despite its associations with the fast, and it is cooked in several unusual ways. The following recipes were given to me by Mihalis Maghoulas, an Ithacan native who tinkers in […]

SKARTSOTSETTA Here’s a dish that some claim was the invention of Zakynthian and Corfiote taverna owners, but others, more wisely, point to Venice as the source of its provenance. (Skartsotsetta—at least etymologically— probably derives from the Italian scartocetti for “packets” because of the way the thinly sliced veal isstuffed, rolled, and braised.) Regardless of its origins, the dish has evolved to […]

KERKYREIKO SOFRITO Sofrito gets its name from the Italian fritto, or “fried.” The dish is traditionally made with veal, but beef can be substituted. Makes 4 to 6 servings Ingredients: 1/3 cup all-purpose flour Freshly ground black pepper to taste Dash of cayenne pepper 2 pounds boneless veal, preferably top round, cut into 6 slices 6 tablespoons […]

KEFALONITIKO LAGOTO This dish is traditionally made with wild hare in Cephalonia, but in its absence rabbit is often used. The name lagoto (lago means “hare” in Greek) is also found in parts of the Peloponnesos, where it refers either to a dish of hare or rabbit thickened with skordalia or, oddly, to pork stewed with skordalia. The Cephalonian version of […]

ORTYKIA ME KOUKIA – ορτυκια με κουκια Quail appear in many varied dishes all over Greece, from the preserved quail so revered in the Mani to the quail-stuffed bread, also from the southern Peloponnesos. From the eastern Aegean, we find another unusual quail dish, in which the tiny birds are stuffed into eggplants (the recipe is included in my first book, The […]

SARTSA – frangokota Guinea fowl in the Ionian region might have an interesting history—or, at the least, an interesting etymology, if one is to believe historian Waverley Root. The Zakynthians call it frangokota, or “French chicken,” while in Corfu it is called faraona, after the Italian gallina faraona, or pharaoh’s turkey. Root says that the bird, indeed a native of Guinea in […]

Pastitsatha was the traditional Sunday meal of Corfu’s well-to-do. It was almost always made with free-range cock or with turkey, which Corfiotes hold in particularly high esteem. Thick tubular spaghetti is needed for this dish. According to island cooks, a proper pastitsatha requires no fewer than 9 spices: allspice, cinnamon, cloves, cumin, nutmeg, paprika, cayenne, salt, and black pepper. Makes 4 to […]

KEFALONITIKI KREATOPITA This recipe, from native Cephalonian Roussa Meleti, originally appeared in my first book, The Food and Wine of Greece. Makes 8 to 10 servings Ingredients: 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for brushing 1/2 pound boneless lamb, trimmed of fat and cut into 1/2-inch pieces 1/2 pound lean boneless pork, cut into 1/2-inch pieces […]