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Greek Rice Pudding/Rizogalo

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Greek Rice Pudding/Rizogalo
Greek Rice Pudding/Rizogalo

150g risotto rice
30ml cornflour
600ml milk
zest of 1 lemon
75g sugar
2 egg yolks

Add the rice to a saucepan and pour in 300ml water.
Set the saucepan over a low heat and cook the rice for 10 minutes, until most of the water has been absorbed.
Add the cornflour to a small bowl and pour about 45ml of milk into it. Stir to dissolve and set aside.
Pour the rest of the milk into the saucepan with the rice, add the lemon zest and simmer on low heat for 20 minutes, stirring often.
Add the cornflour-slurry and the sugar and simmer for 3 minutes more.
Remove the saucepan from the heat and cool for about 10 minutes.
Add the egg yolks and mix through.
Serve the rice pudding slightly warm.

Greek Cheese Pie/Tiropita

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Greek Cheese Pie/Tiropita
Greek Cheese Pie/Tiropita

7 sheets Phyllo pastry
butter, melted
250g feta cheese
250g ricotta
15ml milk
15ml olive oil
30ml chopped dill
2 eggs

Preheat your oven to 170℃ and spray a 24cm loose-bottom cake tin with cooking spray.
Place one sheet of phyllo pastry in the cake tin and gently press it into the bottom and sides of the tin.
Brush the pastry with the melted butter.
Repeat the routine with the remaining 6 sheets of pastry, brushing each with butter and rotating the phyllo sheets slightly so that the corners are staggered. Leave the overhang.
Crumble the feta into a mixing bowl and add the ricotta. Mix through.
Add the milk, olive oil and dill and season with ground black pepper.
Add the eggs to a small bowl, whisk together and pour over the cheese mixture.
Stir the mixture really well until thoroughly mixed through.
Spoon the cheese mixture into the prepared baking tin and spread it out evenly.
Turn the pastry overhang in over the filling so that you have an uncovered area of about 5 cm in the centre. Cut the sheets with scissors if they are too long!! The pastry will be doubled over in places in an irregular way but that is how it is supposed to be – we are in Greece after all!!
Brush the top of the pastry with melted butter and bake in the oven for 40 minutes.
Cool the pie for about 10 minutes before slicing it.
Serve warm or at room temperature.

Greek Meat Pie/Kreatopita

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Greek Meat Pie/Kreatopita
Greek Meat Pie/Kreatopita

45ml olive oil
1kg ground beef/mutton
1 onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
30ml tomato paste
2 tomatoes, chopped
5ml origanum
10ml salt
200ml white wine
62ml basmati rice
a handful of parsley
500g puff pastry, store bought
100g feta cheese, crumbled
1 eg + 15ml water, whisked together

Add the olive oil to a saucepan set over medium-high heat.
Fry the meat in batches until well browned. Set aside.
Lower the heat, add the onion and cook until soft.
Add the garlic and tomato paste and stir-fry for one minute.
Add the chopped tomato, origanum and salt and cook for another 2-3 minutes.
Pour in the wine and simmer until it has reduced by half.
Add 200ml water and cook the meat on a low simmer for 40 minutes.
Take the saucepan from the heat, stir in the rice and parsley and set aside to cool to room temperature.
Taste and adjust seasoning.
Preheat your oven to 180℃ and spray a 22cm loose-bottom cake tin with cooking spray.
Roll the pastry thinner and line the bottom and sides of the baking tin.
Spoon the cooled meat into the pastry shell.
Sprinkle the crumbled feta over the filling.
Cut a pastry round to fit the top of the pie, brush the edges with water and place on top of the filling to form a lid.
Seal the pastry around the edges by scrunching it together and brush all over with the egg wash.
Make a cross slit in the centre of the pastry lid and bake in the oven for 1 hour.
Stand the pie for 15 minutes before slicing to serve.

Baked Greek Omelette

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Baked Greek Omelette
Baked Greek Omelette

30ml + 15ml olive oil
250g leeks, cleaned and sliced
250g spinach, chopped
8 eggs, lightly beaten
45ml chopped mint leaves
45ml dill, chopped
180g feta cheese, crumbled
25g Kefalotiri/parmesan cheese

Preheat your oven to 160℃ and spray a 26cm x 11cm loaf tin with cooking spray.
Add the 30ml olive oil to a frying pan set over medium heat.
Add the leeks and cook for about 10 minutes.
Add the 15ml oil and the chopped spinach and cook for another 3 minutes or so, until wilted.
Spoon the spinach into a bowl and add the eggs, mint, dill, feta, Kefalotir/parmesan, 2,5ml salt and a few grindings of black pepper.
Spoon the mixture into the prepared loaf tin and bake for 45 minutes.
Slice the omelette and serve with fresh tomato.

Chicken Milanese Greek Salad

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Chicken Milanese Greek Salad
Chicken Milanese Greek Salad

Chicken Milanese:
4 chicken breasts, skin and bone removed
125ml flour
2 eggs
250ml Panko breadcrumbs
5ml dried oregano
5ml salt

Salad:
tomato, cut into wedges
red onion, sliced
kalamata olives
feta cheese
45ml olive oil
15ml lemon juice

Set a cast iron pan on to medium-high heat.
Place the flour, eggs and breadcrumbs in three different shallow bowl and beat the eggs together. Add the salt and oregano to the bowl with the flour and mix through.
Dredge the chicken first in the flour, then the egg and finally the breadcrumbs.
Fry the breasts for 4 minutes before turning and frying for another 4 minutes on the other side. Drain on kitchen paper.
Slice the cooked chicken and place on a serving dish.
Mix together the tomato, onion, olives and feta and drizzle with the olive oil and lemon juice. Season the salad with salt and pepper.
Arrange the salad on the serving dish with the chicken and serve with extra lemon wedges.

Yoghurt Beetroot Salad/Pantzarosalata

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Yoghurt Beetroot Salad/Pantzarosalata
Yoghurt Beetroot Salad/Pantzarosalata

This Greek beetroot salad is refreshing, earthy, creamy and crunchy – all at the same time!!

600g beetroot
45ml olive oil
zest and juice of 1 lime
2 cloves of garlic, minced
10ml red wine vinegar
30ml parsley, chopped
320g yoghurt
50g pistachio nuts, chopped

Preheat your oven to 180℃.
Wash the beetroot and wrap each individually in aluminium foil. Bake for one hour and then allow to cool.
Peel the cooked beetroot and cut into small dice. Set aside.
Add the olive oil, lemon zest and juice, garlic and red wine vinegar to a mixing bowl and whisk together.
Add the diced beetroot and parsley and season with salt and pepper.
Add the yoghurt and half of the chopped pistachio and gently mix through.
Scatter the rest of the nuts over the salad and serve.

Greek Shortbread with Lemon Curd

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Greek Shortbread with Lemon Curd
Greek Shortbread with Lemon Curd

250g butter, room temperature and cubed
115g cornflour
340g flour
115g icing sugar, sifted
1 x batch Lemon Curd from this blog

Add the butter, cornflour, flour and icing sugar to the bowl of a food processor and process until the ingredients almost come together in a ball. The mixture is very dry and needs to be scraped down every now and then between processing. Keep going until you can squeeze clumps together between your fingers.
Wrap the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Preheat your oven to 180℃ and spray a miniature muffin tin with cooking spray.
Break pieces of the dough off and press it very tightly into the muffin holes so that it fills it almost to the top.
Bake the shortbread for 15 minutes.
Remove the baking tin from the oven and immediately make indents on the surface of each shortbread by pushing down firmly on it with the back of a 15ml measuring spoon.
Return the tin to the oven and bake for a further 5 minutes.
Remove and cool the shortbread in the muffin tins.
Spoon a teaspoonful of lemon curd into each hollow to serve.

Stuffed Tomatoes/Tomatakia Gemista

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Stuffed Tomatoes/Tomatakia Gemista
Stuffed Tomatoes/Tomatakia Gemista

12 large tomatoes
2,5ml sugar
200ml olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 onions, finely chopped
200g rice/orzo pasta
400ml chicken stock
50g pine nuts, toasted
half a batch of Greek Pesto (Search this blog for the recipe)
50g black olives, pitted and chopped

Preheat your oven to 180℃.
Cut a 2cm slice off the top of each tomato and scoop out the pulp – keep the pulp.
Sprinkle the inside of the tomato with salt, pepper and a pinch of sugar.
Pack the tomatoes close together into a shallow ovenproof dish.
Heat 100ml olive oil, add the onion and garlic and stir-fry until the onion is soft – about 10 minutes.
Add the tomato pulp and simmer until reduced and concentrated in flavour.
Add the rice/pasta, stock and 10ml salt and a few grindings of black pepper. Simmer for another 15 minutes.
Add the pine nuts, greek pesto, feta and olives and stir through.
Spoon the rice mixture into the tomatoes and pour over the remaining olive oil.
Bake for one hour.
Serve the stuffed tomatoes at room temperature with an extra dollop of the Greek Pesto.

Tsatziki

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Tsatziki
Tsatziki

Tsatziki is an entire Greek summer on a plate and goes with anything: bread, roasted vegetables, meat and pita.

1 cucumber (English cucumber is perfectly fine) – 125ml grated and 83ml cut into small cubes
250ml yoghurt
1 clove of garlic, minced
juice of 1 lemon
2,5ml salt
olive oil

Cut the cucumber in half lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon.
Grate the cucumber on the coarse side of a box grater – you need about 125ml when measured.
Now finely dice enough cucumber so that you have about 83ml.
Add the cucumber, yoghurt, garlic, lemon juice and salt to a mixing bowl and stir together.
Refrigerate for 30 minutes or stand at room temperature so that the flavours can develop.
Spoon the tsatziki into a bowl and drizzle with olive oil before serving.
Keep any leftover tsatziki covered in the refrigerator.

Fresh Bloody Mary

by Karen ClaassenLeave a Comment on Fresh Bloody Mary
Fresh Bloody Mary

Tomato Juice:
1,5kg ripe tomatoes, cut into chunks
1 onion, finely chopped
10ml tomato paste
1 red chilli, deseeded and chopped
15ml lemon juice
salt and white pepper

Add the tomato and onion to a blender and process until smooth.
Pass the mixture through a sieve.
Pour the strained juice into a small saucepan and add the tomato paste and chilli to it.
Bring the mixture to a boil, turn down the heat and simmer for 5 minutes.
Skim the surface of the juice while simmering.
Take the saucepan from the heat, add the lemon juice and season to taste with salt and white pepper.
Cool the tomato juice and refrigerate.

For the Bloody Mary:
vodka
1 egg white, lightly beaten
coarse sea salt
olives
rosemary twigs

Dip the rim of a serving glass into the egg white and immediately dip it into the sea salt. Allow to dry.
Fill the glass with ice.
Mix together 150ml tomato juice and 30ml vodka and stir together.
Pour the juice and vodka over the ice and garnish with an olive studded rosemary twig.