First up is Greece. Sorry Greece but we thought that as you might very well be out in the first round we just had to sample some Grecian delicacies. To guide us on our culinary tour we took Maria Elia's fantastic ode to Greek cuisine Smashing Plates. There are so many fantastic recipes in there. We thought a wonderful array of mezze would be a great start to the world cup football tour.
Now as we retrieved most of the recipes from the book I cannot post them here - go and buy the book! It is worth it... but I will give you a general gist of what sort of ingredients are involved.
Broad Bean Hummus
This is one I could share the recipe for. Fantastic to use my broad beans straight from the allotment. This recipe is fairly quick and easy - just a pain to pod all those beans. The colour is fabulous and invokes all those early summer memories.
1 garlic clove, crushed with a little salt
Approx 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Couple small sprigs of mint
Generous squeeze of lemon juice
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1. Put the broad beans in a pan, cover with water and bring to the boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 5-10 minutes (depending on age and size) until tender, then drain. Plunge the broad beans in a bowl of cold water (preferably with some ice cubes in) to stop the cooking. You should see the beans beginning to split out of their skins. Gently squeeze the beans out of the skins. What you are left with is intensely green beans that looks ever so vibrant.
2. Pull the leaves off the mint and very finely chop. Chop the garlic.
3. Put the skinned broad beans in a food processor or blender with the garlic, 3 tablespoons of oil, a good squeeze of lemon juice and some salt and pepper. Process to a thick, slightly coarse purée, adding more oil if it seems too thick and dry.
3. When you're happy with the texture, transfer the purée to a bowl. Taste and adjust the seasoning with more salt, pepper and lemon juice as needed. Garnish with another sprig of mint.
Artichoke and Butter Bean Hummus
This is one of those recipes from Smashing Plates and I would say that this recipe is worth buying the book. The blend of grilled artichokes (I got mine from Stefano's Homemade Food at the local farmers market), cooked butter beans, basil and a few other ingredients were to die for. Make in much the same way as the broad bean hummus by whizzing all the ingredients in the blender.
Pomegranate Skordalia
When I describe the ingredients you might be inclined to think urgh! But another truly wonderful dish from Maria Elia's book. Now there are all types of skordalia which is basically bread or potato or nuts and garlic. pureed. We made the bread version with some ciabatta bread we had (without the crusts) and lots of garlic! Whizz in the blender again (another work out for our humble blender) before adding pomegranate molasses and seasoning.
Here is a recipe online of the basic mix: http://homeingreece.wordpress.com/2012/04/06/skordalia/
Village Salad (sans feta)
Yes it is a Greek salad but in Greece of course you call it something else - village salad - that perfect blend of tomatoes, cucumber, onion and olives. We did actually miss out the feta because I have now become vegan (but that I will leave that story to a separate post). So I am not going to replicate the recipe that you can find all over the web... just go here - http://www.kalofagas.ca/2011/07/20/village-greek-salad/
Mezze Platter Assembled
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| Looks fabulous! |
Score:
Game: 4 Food: 5 (exciting game with plenty of goals. Even though Greece lost we thought they played rather well just unlucky not to score any goals. But the star really was the food - the artichoke and butter bean puree was to die for. Definitely going to be one of those recipes that I keep coming back to.).
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