Greek Feta Salad Recipes

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Feta cheese is the iconic standard that goes into Greek salad. It seems wrong to chomp on fresh tomatoes and cucumbers seasoned with oil and vinegar without at least  a little feta to add some salt and flavor to the mix. I love ordering Greek salads in restaurants. I also love making them at home.

The beauty to making a Greek salad is that the ingredients don’t need to be rigid. Sure, you can follow the recipe I am going to give you. But if I were you, I’d follow that recipe only once and each time you make it, do something different. A salad, afterall, is pretty much impossible to mess up.

If you’re reluctant to change things because you’re afraid it will break tradition consider this: Greek cooks are all about using the freshest, tastiest ingredients around. If tomatoes aren’t in season, there is nothing wrong with leaving them out and adding some lettuce and green peppers instead. It’s the feta, olives, oil, and vinegar that are really the things that make this salad Greek. Why not use your imagination to come up with of your own?

Also, you don’t need to use kalamata olives. There are other Greek olives out there. And believe it or not, feta isn’t the only Greek cheese. There are others. Why not experiment? You can make all kinds of substitutions and additions until you find the ingredient combination that you like the best.

Ingredients:

1 English Cucumber, chopped

3 tomatoes, chopped

1/2 cup chopped scallions

oil and vinegar, to taste

1/2 cup pitted kalamata olives.

1/2 cup crumbled feta

dried oregano as a garnish

Instructions:

Add the tomato, onion, and cucumber in a bowl. Add oil and vinegar. Toss to coat. Transfer to a serving dish. Add olives and feta and sprinkle oregano over the top. Serve immediately. Makes 4-6 servings depending on how big the portions are.

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Ancient Greek Recipes - Wine Soaked Fruit with Honey

This fruit salad is light and refreshing. You can use any Greek wine you can find. However, I reccommend Mavrodaphne. It is a dessert wine and very sweet - this makes it better suited in this fruit salad. The fruits that were chosen were available in Ancient Greece - at least their ancestors were. The fruits that are available now may be slightly different than they were back then.

You can basically use any fruit you want. I just included these as guidelines. Also, the almonds add crunch and are a tradtional Ancient Greek food. You can, however, also use almonds. Try to find raw orange blossom honey if you can to try to get the flavor as close to the Greek honeys as you can.

Ingredients:

1 cup cubed honey dew melon

1 cup cubed cantalope

2 peaches, pitted and sliced

2 cups grapes, any variety (golden is best, however)

1 cup Greek wine

2 tablespoons honey

3 tablespoons chopped almonds or walnuts

Instructions:

Add chopped fruit to a large serving bowl. Pour wine and honey over fruit and toss to incorporate the flavors. Let sit for thirty minutes. Garnish with almonds or walnuts and serve. You can serve this in pretty dessert cups. Be sure that each serving gets a splash of the wine/honey dressing.

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Greek Food is Part of the Mediterranean Diet

The Mediterranean Diet has been getting a lot of press as being one of the healthiest diets in the world. In fact, much of the initial studying took place on Crete. When people first learned that the Mediterranean Diet was so healthy, they based their iinformation on those initial studies.

Of course, now the diet has been studied even more and we understand things about the diet that we didn’t at first. Here are some of the things that make the diet so healthy:

Olive OilModerate consumption of wineFresh fruits and vegetablesLimited consumption of meatHigher consumption of fish and seafoodCheese and yogurt are eaten on a moderate basisPeople enjoy their meals with familyPhysical activity levels are fairly high

If you follow the basic guidelines of the Mediterranean diet you will be setting yourself up to have a healthy life. Just remember that eating to excess will get you into trouble so it isn’t just the foods that make it healthy. It’s the lifestyle. Be sure to lower your portion sizes and get enough exercise and you’ll be on your way to better health.

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Greek Butter Cookies Recipe (Kourabiedes)

Kourabiedes, or Greek Butter Cookies are my all time favorite Greek dessert cookies. They are known as the “celebration” cooking and are on the table whenever there is a special event such as a wedding or Christmas. I personally like to make them whenever I want! (But never, ever serve them at a funeral - my mom learned this one the hard way).

Here’s a recipe that’s fairly easy. My mom’s is a little more complex. I’ll share that one a little later but these are still delicious!

Ingredients:

4 Sticks Sweet, Unsalted Butter

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