Oven Baked Sole With Chickpeas

One of the facets of Greek cooking that I love is that it's so versatile. It touches upon vegetables, fruits, poultry, meats and mince, seafood, legumes, grains and pasta.

Greek food relies on herbs to flavour dishes, and an array of spices. Greek food can be complex and it can be easy.

This fish dish is a perfect of example of quality ingredients, prepared simply to highlight the freshness and to maximize flavour.

Today, I'm giving you more tastes of the Aegean, in particular the Cycladic islands of Syros and Sifnos. Syros is an island I've visited in previous travels to Greece and Sifnos was most recently visited this past summer.

This recipe for baked sole comes from Syros and the feature fish is sole, seasoned and baked simply with olive oil, lemon juice, Capers and dill.

The side dish highlights Sifnos' beloved use of chickpeas and here, I've baked them with bay, onions, garlic and cherry tomatoes.

This combo makes a perfect weeknight dish as the ingredients are readily available at the market.

The prep is quick, both main and side dish can be thrown in the oven.
Go change into something more comfortable, open the mail, open a bottle of wine and set the table.

Now your oven baked sole with chick peas is ready to be served. Don't hesitate to break some crusty bread and mop-up the olive oil and sauce in your plate.

Oven Baked Sole
(serves 4)

4 fillets of sole
1/2 cup olive oil
4 Tbsp. of capers, drained
juice of 1/2 lemon
1/2 cup chopped fresh dill
salt and pepper

Baked Chickpeas
1 can of chickpeas, drained
1/3 cup water
1 medium onion, sliced
1/2 pint of cherry tomatoes, halved
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 bay leaves
1/4 cup olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Pre-heated 375F oven

1. Rinse and pat-dry your fillets. Thirty minutes before baking, season the fillets with salt and let them sit.
2. For the Baked Chickpeas, in a baking vessel, add all the chickpeas ingredients together and toss well. Place in the oven and they should take about 1 hour and be ready when you fillets of sole are also done.
   
3. Place your fillets on an oiled baking sheet, pour the oil, lemon juice, dill and capers over the fillets. Bake for 30 minutes and serve warm with a lemon wedge.

Pork Chops "Krasates" (Χοιρινές Μπριζόλες Κρασάτες )

When I'm in Thessaloniki, one of my favourite places to eat is at the "Kourdisto Gourouni" or Wind-Up Pig.

This Greek brasserie is located in the Square of Agia Sophia and they've been serving up delicious Greek food that's innovative yet stays true to tradition.

This dish is inspired by a Kourdisto Gourouni dish I had with a veal fillet and another dish my mom prepared for me this past summer in Greece.

What you need here are some juicy pork chops (nothing too lean), good dry white wine, some stock, olive oil, squeeze of lemon juice, dried Greek oregano and plump green olives.

As much as I love grilling outdoors, those first cold days of autumn when winter bites yours ears are here. A dish like this satisfies my need for meat and it transports me back to Thessaloniki, one of the best cities in Greece to dine in.

Go out and get some meaty pork chops, some fat content on them (so they don't dry out), a large skillet and a good bottle of dry Greek wine.

Tsantali Makedonikos works wonderfully here and you can be transported to an outdoor table, sitting in front of the taverna, sipping wine, people watching and eating down home Greek food.


Pork Chops "Krasates" (Χοιρινές Μπριζόλες Κρασάτες )
(serves 4)

4 bone-in pork chops
salt & pepper
2 tsp. sweet paprika
flour for dredging
1/4 cup olive oil
2/3 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup chicken/vegetable stock
2 bay leaves
6-8 large green olives, pitted & chopped
juice of 1/2 lemon
4 tsp. dry Greek oregano

1. Rinse and pat-dry your pork chops. Place about a cup of flour into a plate and season with salt and pepper and the paprika. Mix with a fork and taste and adjust seasoning. Dredge your pork chops in the seasoned flour and set aside.
   
2. Place a large skillet on your stovetop over medium-high heat. Add your olive oil and sprinkle some flour to test if the oil is hot enough. Place your chops in the skillet and brown both sides of your chops, about 2-3 minutes per side and then remove and reserve.
   
3. Now reduce your heat to medium and add your wine, stock and bay leaves and simmer while scraping up the brown bits for 2-3 minutes. Place your pork chops back in the skillet and cover. Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 30 minutes or until the chops are tender and the sauce has reduced to half.
4. Add the chopped green olives, the lemon juice and Greek oregano and swirl to incorporate. Adjust seasoning with salt and pepper, remove the bay leaves and serve.
5. I paired this dish with roasted garlic mashed potatoes and sauteed oyster mushrooms.
   

Doing the Big Apple

I'm going to New York City! Yes...it's been quite a few years and I'll be visiting the Big Apple next week and I'll be spending one glorious week there.

For those that haven't been to New York, bump your travel itinerary up to include a visit to one of the world's best (if not best) cities in the world.

New York is multi-cultural, it's hospitable, quite safe for a city of it's size, culturally vibrant, beautiful, a food lovers paradise and full of energy.

I'll never forget the first time I landed in New York: it was night and I never before had seen a city lit up so brightly by lights. Maybe it's just me but my body is constantly a'rush from adrenalin, being in the action, amid so many people and feeling the pulse of this great city.

While in New York, I'm going to further explore the city and many of it's storied neighborhoods, check out the Greektown in Astoria, the exciting restaurants that are part of the "new wave" of Greek cuisine and with some good fortune, meet some fellow food bloggers who live in the New York City area.

If you're in the area, contact me via email and I'd love to meet you ...this would be a highlight of my trip!

Since we're on the topic of the Big Apple, I made a elegant dessert using quince. Us Greeks call quince "Kydonia" and the French call them Pommes de Cydon.

Quince look like an rugged apple and the flesh is quite firm - not edible raw. Quince are used in sweet and savory cooking and it's often paired with pork or made into a preserve or this case, poached.

The first attraction one has to quince is it's aroma. One only needs to walk past a tree of ripe quince or pass a fruit stand to know that some quince are nearby.

Plutarch reports that a Greek bride would nibble a quince to perfume her kiss before entering the bridal chamber, "in order that the first greeting may not be disagreeable nor unpleasant" (Roman Questions 3.65).

Inspration for this dish came from Angela's Food Love. About a month ago she shared a poached pear dish that immediately made me perk up and bookmark this dish. Angela usually posts one dish per week and each and everytime I get notice of her dish, I'm never disappointed, often delighted. I encourage you to visit Angela's blog...tell her "Kalofagas" sent ya!

Taking inspiration from Angela's dish, I applied some Greek ingredients (including quince) and poached it an aromatic bath of Greek red wine, spices and I made a mixture of strained Greek yogurt, Manouri cheese and honey and piped it into the center.

The photo is self-explanatory...the dessert was a hit!

Poached Quince With Manouri
(serves 4)

1 bottle of good Greek red wine
4 quince, peeled and cored
1 cinnamon stick
4-5 whole cloves
1/2 cup Petimezi
1/2 cup honey
splash of vanilla extract


Manouri Filling
8 oz. of room temperature Manouri cheese
1 cup strained Greek yogurt
3 Tbsp. of Greek honey
1 shot of Ouzo

1. Into a pot large enough to hold your quince, add all the ingredients of your poaching liquid and bring to a boil. Lower to a simmer and gently drop your quince and poach your quince for about 20-30 minutes or until fork tender (you may have to flip your quince to poach both halves).
2. Carefully remove the quince from the poaching liquid, strain the the liquid to remove the spices and return to your pot. Reduce over medium heat until you have a thick syrup. Remove from the heat and allow to cool.
3. In a small bowl, add the Manouri cheese, strained Greek yogurt, Ouzo and honey and mix well with a spatula or a hand mixer. Spoon the contents into a piping bag or make your own with a disposable plastic bag and snip a small hole in one of the bottom corners.
4. Assemble your dessert by spooning the wine syrup onto the plate's bottom and then set the quince on top. Now pipe the Manouri filling into each hole in the middle of the quince and serve.

NOTE:

Petimezi is a syrup boiled down from the grape must during the wine harvest. Italians have a product called Saba and similar products can be found in Mid-Eastern stores called "grape syrup".

Manouri cheese is made from the whey leftover from the cheese making process. It's a young cheese that's cross between a firm ricotta and mild but still tangy cream cheese. It works wonderful for savory and sweer dishes.

Artichoke Pie (Ταβερνίσια αγκιναρόπιτα της Τήνου)

Another island in the Cyclades of Greece is Tinos. Tinos is the island just before reaching party-central Mykonos.

The contrast in vacationers that attend both islands is that of the late nights of Mykonos, loud thumping Techno & House and all-nighters and the more normal Tinos with vacationers seeking the beach, idlyllic town life, a fine taverna and it's popular religious attraction of Church of Panagia (Virgin Mary).

One of the holiest days in the Greek-Orthodox calendar is August 15th and many pilgrims visit Tinos to crawl up it's long incline of steps in hopes of being one of the blessed with a miracle from the icon of Panagia.

Tinos is also famous for it's artichokes and in keeping with the Greeks' natural ingenuity, taverna owners have come up with creative ways to showcase this local produce in an array of dishes.

I found an interesting recipe from Diane Kochilias who has written many cookbooks on Greek and Mediterranean cuisine.

She describes this dish as being inspired by the taverna owners' many renditions of their Artichoke pie. The Greek island of Kefallonia (on the Ionian side of Greece) also has their own Artichoke pie but we'll chat about that another time.

This dish stood out for me because one of the main ingredients here is bread slices. I have a feeling the origins of this dish are very peasant and in keeping with the Greek tradition of stretching your ingredients to utmost limit.

I'm sure day-old bread was used to make Artichoke Pie (you can too) but I've found that lighter, less dense bread works best here for absorbing moisture and flavour in the end result.

In this dish I used preserved, jarred artichoke hearts, some grated Graviera cheese (sheep's milk Grueyere), Bechamel sauce and some fresh thyme.

This dish is easy, great offering for a buffet, part of a light lunch or serve a wedge as a snack. It also came in handy as I was able to use up a jar of artichokes staring at me in the fridge and it hit the spot for wanting a light lunch with a salad on the side.

Artichoke Pie (Ταβερνίσια αγκιναρόπιτα της Τήνου)

a buttered 13X9X2" bakiing dish
1/4 cup olive oil
3 large onions, diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 large loaf of rustic bread, crust removed & cut into thick slices
2 tsp. of fresh thyme
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. ground black pepper
approx. dozen artichoke hearts, cut into bite-sized pieces (poached if fresh, I used jarred)
1 1/2 grated Graviera cheese (Gruyere is fine)
3 cups of Bechamel Sauce (or 1/2 of my recipe)
thyme sprigs for garnish

1. Melt the olive oil in a large skillet and add your onions and garlic and saute over medium-low heat for about 20-30 minutes or until soft and translucent. Add your fresh thyme and season with salt and pepper. Allow to cool and set aside.
2. Pre-heat your oven to 400F. Now make your Bechamel sauce as per my instructions with the 1 cup of grated Graviera and set aside and keep warm.
   
3. Spoon some Bechamel Sauce on the bottom of the baking dish and lay your first layer of bread slices. Now spoon half of your sauteed onions over the bread, followed by half the artichoke pieces, some Bechamel sauce and some grated cheese. Repeat with the remaining ingredients in the same order.
4. Bake until tender and the top is golden-brown, about 30-40 minutes. Allow to cool slightly, slice into portioned squares and serve.