greek recipe

Greek Rice

FeaturedLeave a comment

Good side dishes can make a meal.  I love this with roast chicken but it’s also yummy with fish, barbecued meats, or griddled halloumi.

Rice can be a bit meh, but herbs and lemon give this a really fresh taste.  I used chicken stock, but you can swap this for vegetable stock if you’re vegetarian.

Ingredients

100 Grams Uncooked rice (I used basmati, but if you’re using a different type of rice then make sure to rinse it first so it fluffs up)

1 Small onion or shallot (finely chopped)

1-2 Cloves of garlic (finely chopped)

1 Tbsp Olive oil

200 mil Chicken/vegetable stock

1 Lemon (juice and zest)

1 Tsp Dried Oregano (or 1 Tbsp fresh oregano)

1 Tsp Dried Dill (or 1 Tbsp fresh dill)

Method

  • Heat the oil in a large pot with a lid, and gently fry the onion/shallot over a medium heat until it starts to become translucent, then add the garlic and cook for a further minute
  • Add the rice, salt and stock and cover the pot with a lid, before bringing to the boil.  Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.  Remove from the heat and the rice should continue to cook with the residual heat until the rice has absorbed all the stock (if you’re using brown rice you may need to cook for longer)
  • Grate the zest of the lemon with a fine grater, before squeezing the juice and setting to one side
  • Stir the lemon juice and zest into the rice and cover with a lid again for another 5-10 minutes before checking that the rice is fully cooked before stirring in the herbs.
  • This can be eaten hot or cold.

Spanikopita (Greek Feta and Spinach Pie)

Seaneen's Sunnyside KitchenLeave a comment

This pie is very satisfying but still quite light and a good way to get your daily dose of veggies.

I use frozen spinach, because it’s cheaper and a kilo of fresh spinach will take up half your kitchen, make sure to squeeze out as much water as possible so the pie won’t be soggy. Fresh herbs add flavour, and while dill is traditionally used, I used parsley and mint which are also used in some parts of Greece.

Filo pastry can be bought in most larger super markets. Make sure to cover the pastry with a slightly damp tea towel to stop it drying out when you are making the pie.

The pie can be eaten hot or cold and can live in your fridge for 2-3 days. It’s great as a lunch dish served with some salad or as a side dish.

Ingredients

1kg Frozen spinach (defrosted, and all excess liquid squeezed out)

3 eggs

Handful of finely chopped parsley and mint

250 Grams Filo pastry

200 Grams Feta style cheese (crumbled)

1 Leek or bunch of scallions/spring onions (finely chopped)

1 Tbsp Oil

25 Grams Butter (melted)

Salt and pepper (to taste)

2 Tbsp Sesame seeds (optional)

Method

  • Preheat the oven to 180 degrees (Celsius)
  • In a large pan, heat the oil over a medium heat and fry the leek until soft. Set to one side and allow to cool
  • Add the drained spinach to a large bowl and loosen up with a fork. Stir in the eggs, feta, herbs leeks and seasoning. Stir until combined
  • Grease a 6 x 9 in baking tin and line with sheets of filo pastry, brush each sheet lightly with butter before topping with another sheet (lay 5-6 sheets of filo pastry as a base)
  • When the tray is lined, spread the spinach mixture evenly across the base. Fold in any overlapping pastry and top the pie with the leftover sheets of pastry (brush each sheet lightly with butter before topping with the next.
  • Sprinkle with sesame seeds, and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes until brown and crispy

Walnut Skordalia

Seaneen's Sunnyside KitchenLeave a comment

This is a traditional Greek dip and is super easy to make and super delicious. I made this as part of a meze at our February supper club, and it was the most popular dish of the night.

Delicious as a dip with vegetables or pitta bread

While you can use it as a dip, I’ve also used this as filling in wraps and sandwiches along with salad and chopped vegetables and it was amazingly tasty. It’s also really good drizzled across roast vegetables. To be honest you could spread this on a flip flop and I’d eat it, it tastes that good. This is also vegan, so you can keep all the non meat eaters in your life happy with something totally scrumptious.

Just 5 ingredients, and 5 minutes of your time to produce something totally tasty

Ingredients

80 Grams Walnuts

40 Grams Breadcrumbs (I know I bang on about it, but one of my favourite kitchen hacks is making a big batch of bread crumbs to keep in the freezer, it makes recipes like this a 2 minute job)

1-2 Cloves of garlic, roughly chopped (I used 2 and it was pretty garlicky which I don’t mind, but adjust to your own taste)

2 Tbsp Red wine vinegar (Again adjust to your own taste, the first time I tried a the recipe out it was a bit too sharp for me, so I’ve reduced the amount of vinegar but have a taste and you can always add more)

100ml Olive oil

Method

  1. Add the walnuts to a food processor and blitz for a couple of minutes until the nuts are finely ground
  2. Add the breadcrumbs, garlic, oil and vinegar and blitz again. The mix is meant to be quite thick, but if it is too thick for you, you can a small amount of water and and blitz until you get the consistency you like
Also great in wraps and sandwiches