Traditional Greek recipes

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A compilation of 10 traditional Greek meals for anyone interested in cooking Greek food.

A compilation of 10 traditional Greek meals for anyone interested in cooking Greek food.

Παραδοσιακές ελληνικές συνταγές. Anyone interested in learning more about Greek cooking and traditional Greek recipes will welcome this post! We’ve compiled a selection of traditional Greek foods which go beyond the better known, and amazing moussaka and pastitsio (don’t worry, we’ve included those too!). We hope that this will help inspire you to make Greek main meals that you may not have heard of, but that we think you will certainly enjoy.

Traditional Greek recipes are very regional; depending upon what area of Greece you are living and eating in, recipes will vary. Our parents are from the Peloponnese, Messinia to be more exact. So, some of these recipes, and their specific preparation are specific to that area, and to our family. We hope that you will enjoy them as much as we do!

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Spaghetti squash and roasted vegetables

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A vegan tray bake make of spaghetti squash topped with a variety of roasted vegetables.

A vegan tray bake made of spaghetti squash topped with a variety of roasted vegetables.

We’re relatively new to the world of spaghetti squash. This is not a gourd we grew up with and when we first showed it to our parents their only question was, “Will it make a good pita?”. Greeks like our parents love using squash to make things like pita and fritters, not as substitutes for pasta.

We love spaghetti squash! It’s not that we are trying to cut out carbs (we live for bread), but we genuinely love the way it tastes. We also love how magical it is to see a once solid vegetable transform into delicate strands of golden yellow. One of our favourite ways to serve spaghetti squash is topped with roasted vegetables. This makes a perfect light meal, but also works as the side to something like grilled salmon or steak. Or, you can keep your meal vegan by serving the spaghetti squash and roasted vegetables with some chickpea fritters

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Roasted cauliflower and kale salad

~ miakouppa ~ 2 Comments
A delicious plant-based salad starring roasted cauliflower, chopped kale and with a wonderful vinaigrette

A delicious plant-based salad starring roasted cauliflower, chopped kale and with a wonderful vinaigrette

Do you have people in your life that hate cauliflower? Despise kale? Shun away from salad on most days? Then this is the recipe for them! Our intention is not to sound flippant. On the contrary, with all due respect, we think you should serve our roasted cauliflower and kale salad to these cauliflower, kale and salad haters. It’s fun to see their face transform from cringe to shock as they take a bite and realize that cauliflower, kale and salad aren’t that bad after all.

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Lemon ricotta cake

~ miakouppa ~ 4 Comments
Easy lemon ricotta cake that is full of citrus flavour and with a great texture.

Easy lemon ricotta cake that is full of citrus flavour and with a great texture.

We never pretend to be something that we’re not. Same goes for our recipes. The BEST baklava? No, probably not the best in the world, but the best we’ve ever had. The EASIEST banana bread? Easy is relative, so who are we to say (although it has been successfully made by a second grader). It was not entirely comfortable for us then, to hear that our lemon ricotta cake was being compared to the Starbucks lemon loaf, and that our dessert rivaled, and in some opinions, surpassed it. Did we set out with this goal in mind? Were we intent on creating yet another copycat recipe? Not at all. Are we happy with the result? You bet we are! We bet you will be too.

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Easy chicken noodle soup

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A perfect, easy chicken noodle soup! The only recipe you need for this classic soup!

A perfect, easy chicken noodle soup! The only recipe you need for this classic soup!

When one of us first got pregnant we had an urgent need to achieve a few motherly goals. We were convinced that we could not reach the status of Mama without knowing how to a) knit, b) sing at least a dozen lullabies, in Greek, English and French and c) make the perfect pot of chicken noodle soup. The knitting was easy – our dad whipped out his old knitting needles (yes, that’s right…our dad) and showed us knit and purl, and we were on our way to making baby a blanket. Lullabies were easy too; out of tune perhaps, but easy. As for the soup, our parents convinced us that the only chicken soup recipe we needed was avgolemono soup. In fact they told us that we didn’t even need the recipe – our job was to rest and care for baby, and they would make us soup by the gallon if we wanted them too.

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Hot chocolate

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A rich and creamy hot chocolate

A rich and creamy hot chocolate

Canadian winters were a highlight of our childhood. For those of you who live in places where the climate is always sunny, or rainy, or foggy, or windy – but never snowy, allow us to paint you a picture. It will be white. All white. Glistening white so bright, that at certain times of the day staring at it hurts your eyes.

As kids we quickly learned that not all snow was created equal. There is the powdery soft fresh fallen snow that was perfect for falling into backwards. We would stare into the sky while doing horizontal jumping jacks and then carefully stand up and then stand back to admire our created snow angel. There are the big, beautiful snowflakes that fall so gently, landing on your lashes and on your tongue as you stick it out for a taste of winter. There is the wet snow that is exactly what you need to make the best snowman, the best snow fort and the best snowballs. You have not lived until you have spent three hours building a snow fort with your friends and then another three bombarding your neighbourhood rivals with snowballs.

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Red cabbage salad with apple

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A delicious and beautiful side salad made with red cabbage and apple.

A delicious and beautiful side salad made with red cabbage and apple.

We’re only a few days into January and we’re already exhausted by the fact that we’ve got so much riding on this year. In addition to all our work, blog, and family goals, we have our own personal goals too. We join the masses who, when the clock chimes midnight, commit to healthier living. We’re not unhealthy in general. We don’t smoke, we don’t drink excessively, we don’t eat dessert every day…but we know we can do better. Maybe we could take the stairs instead of the elevator. Maybe, when we finally get into bed, we can go to sleep instead of scrolling through Instagram. Maybe when we eat koulourakia, we can stop at two instead of seven. Or maybe, if we eat more salad, we don’t have to do any of that!

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Melomakarona ice cream cake

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An incredible melomakarona ice cream cake with chocolate fudge and whipped cream topping.

An incredible melomakarona ice cream cake with chocolate fudge and whipped cream topping.

We can barely contain our excitement! It was during one of our recent phone conversations, which tend to cover everything from what we’re watching on Netflix to why we are wired to love bread as much as we do, that we came up with the idea for a melomakarona ice cream cake. This recipe came to us as we were talking about our melomakarona cheesecake, and we were wondering if we could ever create another dessert to rival that one! We were so excited by the possibility of this ice cream cake that the next day we baked up a huge batch of frozen tyropitakia to make space in our freezer, bought the ice cream, and set to recipe developing.

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Gingerbread cake with cream cheese frosting

~ miakouppa ~ 4 Comments
The perfect gingerbread cake with a luscious cream cheese frosting

The perfect gingerbread cake with a luscious cream cheese frosting

We have a few things on our bucket list. A food tour through Tuscany is one. Front row seats to Fashion Week in Paris is another. Unlimited and uninterrupted time to invest in making the most magical and intricate gingerbread house in the days before Christmas is another. Tuscany and Paris may be harder to pull off, but a gingerbread house? Come on! Surely we should be able to manage that at some point.

Until then, we’ll be satisfied with baking ginger flavoured cookies and gingerbread cakes, like this one. The combination of ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and molasses in our gingerbread cake with cream cheese frosting makes the entire house smell like Christmas, so maybe we do have a gingerbread house after all – and we live in it!

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Kalamata olive tapenade

~ miakouppa ~ 2 Comments
A Kalamata olive tapenade is the perfect quick and easy meze!

A Kalamata olive tapenade is the perfect quick and easy meze

We literally feel as though we have won the tapenade jackpot! Making an olive tapenade is pretty straightforward, but it can be a bit time consuming when you have to pit the olives yourself. Sure, you can use the canned black olives that taste like plastic if you like; those are usually pitted. But we’re fans of flavour, and great flavour at that so we prefer to make our tapenade with Kalamata olives; the pitting is worth it.

But what if we told you that you could make our amazing tapenade and not have to pit a thing! Wouldn’t that be amazing? It would be! And it is! The MEZE brand of pitted Kalamata sliced olives makes tapenade making a breeze. Simply add all ingredients to a food processor, give it a whiz, and you are good to go. Kalamata olive tapenade makes the easiest and most delicious appetizer!

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