Dilema

I can't decide what to make for supper! Do I go with a lentil & rice dish and some sort of pan-fried chicken breast? Or do I venture out of familiar territory with a green bean and chicken thigh kokkinisto, à la Maria?

I've also got to get off my ass and clean out my fridge and take stock of my pantry. I suppose that starts with washing the mason jars...sigh.

In other news, we got a huge shipment of treats from my aunt Renna in Chania last week, so now I have Greek honey, Greek oregano, paximadia from the village bakery, delicious dried figs...awesome! I had to laught though, there was a bag of loukoumia in there, which expired at the end of June (it took this package three months to get here, for ridiculous reasons I won't get into) but I've been eating anyway. Obviously food colouring in Greece does not represent the same flavours as it does in North America: sure, the yellow was a citrus flavour, but the pink? It took me a moment to decide why my mouth tasted like soap, until I realized that the flavour was "rose". Having had roses in edible form for the first time when I was in university (a coworker once made candied rose petals at the historical village where I worked), I'm still not really used to the idea of something that tastes like perfume in my food. I've had rose loukoumi before (a chocolate-covered Turkish brand), but it's not at the top of my list. The green was even more of a surprise for me - one would think...lime? Sour apple? Mint? Even perhaps pistaccio? But nooooo, it was mastiha (gum mastic), which is another strange, herbal flavour that I didn't really experience until I was well into my twenties.

So I have a bag of mediocre quality bulk-section-at-the-grocery-store loukoumi (Turikish delight) in rose, mastic, and...other mystery flavours. Which I probably shouldn't even eat because they're like three weeks past their expiry date. So why am I craving them right now? Hmmm...

Ryzogalo

I'm still getting the hang of formatting my blog - the pictures never go where I want them to! I have to go in and change the HTML around! It's kind of annoying!

Anyhow, I had been craving ryzogalo for a while, so I decided to make some! At 8:30 pm! I had to go to Sobey's for some homogenized milk (3.25%?) and some more eggs. I followed the most common recipe that's floating around - it's a recipebazaar and about.com, but made a few changes. First, I added a splash of vanilla, 'cause that's just how I roll. Secondly, I found 3/4 c of sugar to be overkill, and I needed something to cut the sweetness. Lacking a lemon for zest, I used some of my bottled Sicilian lemon juice. I also used arborio rice because it was the only short-grain rice that I had in the cupboard...which made the corn starch and egg yolks kind of unnecessary. I think next time I'll skip those, or go straight for the long grain rice...but somehow, using Uncle Ben's to make ryzogalo just seemed wrong...

Also, it seems I need to acquire some sort of shaker for my cinnamon, because the spice jar that it's in has huge holes which means that when I want some cinnamon, I get LOTS of cinnamon. All at once. All in one spot. Whether I'd like the finished product to look pretty or not.

The bf and I had this as a snack, eventually (how many times did the pot of milk boil over...I don't even want to think about it!), and he loved it! I never did tell him it had "raw" egg yolks in it. And now that I've managed to do that, I should try making spaghetti carbonara again...


This post is dedicated to those late, lazy summer mornings in Galata, eating my aunt's chilled ryzogalo and drinking my chocolate goat's milk...

Keftedes & hummus

The other day (Saturday?) Chris decided to try his hand at making keftedes, those delicious little fried Greek meatballs which are equally good served hot or cold. He's always liked them but having them at Greek Easter at my aunt's house reminded him just how much he liked them, and he decided that he wanted my mother's recipe. One phone call and a trip to Victory market later, we were set. I was surprised to note that my mother's recipe calls for crushed saltines rather than milk-soaked bread, but I won't argue because they taste great.

(recipe to follow)

*****

Last night, knowing that I'd be taking the last few keftedes to work with me for lunch, I decided that I wanted some hummus to dip them in. Ingredients? A can of chickpeas (water reserved), three or four teaspoons of tahini, some salt, lemon juice, 3-4 cloves of garlic, tabasco sauce, ground cumin, ground corriander, paprika, parsley, and a dash of olive oil. Whipping the tahini at the beginning with some reserved chickpea water and lemon juice gives the end result an amazingly fluffy texture, which allows you to cut down the amount of oil used in the dip - I poured a thin stream in at one point, but mostly saved it for a drizzled garnish at the end. I don't normally add any parsley, but I had some on hand thanks to Chris' craving for keftedes, although I have to admit that it didn't really do much for the flavour of the dish. My first experiences with hummus included a "sixty pepper" hummus, so the tabasco is a nod to that preference (I don't think I go overboard in this deparment since it's not nearly as noticable as the garlic or lemon, or even the tahini).

The results? Chris claims he "doesn't really like hummus" and said that he didn't want any, but pretty soon he was taking my mini tostitos away from me and dunking them in the hummus, and ate enough for me to say that yes, he does indeed like hummus! I'd post some pics, but I've already finished it off along with the keftedes. This, combined with a delicious lemony pilaf Chris made the other night, made for a very satisfying lunch!