Recipes › Greek

Greek cuisine

Every Greek dish we have, with the recipe for each — 63 of them, each one written for this site rather than adapted from anybody else's.

By protein

• Pork (3)
• Beef (4)
• Veal (1)
• Lamb (7)
• Fish (5)
• Egg (22)
• Vegetarian (28)
• Vegetables (20)
• Desserts (17)
• Pastes, sauces and basics (7)

By region

• Mediterranean recipes (750)
• European recipes (674)

Every Greek dish

• Amygdalopita, sourced from Greece. An almond and semolina syrup cake soaked in two goes rather than one, because semolina takes syrup more slowly than breadcrumb does. Egg, vegetarian.
• Amygdalota, sourced from Greece. Almond sweets shaped and dried rather than baked, where the only cooking is a brief set in a low oven. Egg, vegetarian.
• Avgolemono, sourced from Greece. A soup thickened with egg and lemon alone, which curdles the instant it boils and is therefore never allowed to. Egg.
• Baklava, sourced from Greece. Layered filo and nuts where cold syrup meets hot pastry, which is the only combination that does not go soggy. vegetarian.
• Béchamel, sourced from Greece. A thick white sauce set with egg yolks, made stiffer than a sauce because it is a lid rather than a dressing. Egg.
• Bougatsa, sourced from Greece. A semolina custard in filo with no syrup anywhere, cut into squares with a blade and dusted at the moment it is served. Egg, vegetarian.
• Bourdeto, sourced from Greece. Fish cooked in a fierce red onion sauce where the paprika goes in off the heat, and the fish is never turned. Fish.
• Dakos, sourced from Greece. A hard barley rusk softened only by grated tomato and oil, assembled in an order that decides whether it goes soggy.
• Diples, sourced from Greece. Unleavened dough rolled until it is translucent and folded in the hot oil with two forks, then dipped in honey. Egg, vegetarian.
• Dolmades, sourced from Greece. Vine leaves rolled around rice that is only half cooked, weighted down with a plate so they cannot unroll. vegan.
• Fanouropita, sourced from Greece. A spiced cake with no egg, butter or milk in it, where orange juice and bicarbonate do the lifting. vegan.
• Fasolada, sourced from Greece. A bean soup whose body comes from a quantity of olive oil that looks like a mistake, and from beans salted only at the end. vegan.
• Fried Small Fish, sourced from Greece. Small whole fish floured and nothing else, fried in small batches so the pan never cools, and eaten whole. Fish.
• Galaktoboureko, sourced from Greece. A hot semolina custard poured into filo and baked, so the pastry sets around a filling that is already thick. Egg, vegetarian.
• Gigandes Plaki, sourced from Greece. Big flat beans baked uncovered in tomato until the top ones go leathery and the sauce goes sticky. vegan.
• Giouvetsi, sourced from Greece. Lamb braised until it is nearly done and then finished in the oven with raw orzo, which cooks in the braising liquid. Lamb.
• Greek Salad, sourced from Greece. Tomato, cucumber and a whole slab of feta with no leaves in it at all, dressed with oil and oregano and nothing else.
• Gyros, sourced from Greece. Thin slices of marinated pork stacked, pressed and roasted as one block, then shaved off the outside. Pork.
• Halva, sourced from Greece. Semolina toasted in oil until it smells of biscuits, then flooded with hot syrup in one go and turned out of a mould. vegan.
• Kakavia, sourced from Greece. A fish soup where the first fish are cooked to pieces to make the broth and a second lot goes in whole at the end. Fish.
• Kalitsounia, sourced from Greece. Small open pastries with their own dough rather than filo, pinched into points so the cheese sits proud in the middle. Egg.
• Karydopita, sourced from Greece. A syrup cake built on walnuts and dry breadcrumbs instead of flour, which is what lets it take up syrup without collapsing. Egg, vegetarian.
• Kleftiko, sourced from Greece. Lamb sealed so completely that nothing escapes for four hours, which is a different cooking method from roasting it. Lamb.
• Kokoretsi, sourced from Greece. Lamb offal threaded on a spit and bound in intestine wound round it like thread, cooked slowly until the casing crisps. Lamb.
• Kolokythopita, sourced from Greece. A courgette pie where the courgette is salted and squeezed twice, because it holds more water than spinach does. Egg.
• Koulourakia, sourced from Greece. Twisted butter biscuits that must be shaped from cold dough, baked until deep gold rather than pale. Egg, vegetarian.
• Kourabiedes, sourced from Greece. Almond shortbread buried in icing sugar while still warm, where the butter is beaten far longer than seems reasonable. Egg, vegetarian.
• Kreatopita, sourced from Greece. A meat pie whose filling is braised and then cooled completely, because hot filling steams the pastry from the inside. Lamb.
• Lagana, sourced from Greece. A flat sesame-covered loaf dimpled all over with the fingers, so it stays flat instead of rising into a loaf. vegan.
• Loukaniko, sourced from Greece. A coarse pork sausage scented with orange peel and fennel, where everything including the mincer is kept cold. Pork.
• Loukoumades, sourced from Greece. A wet yeast batter dropped into hot oil, where the batter is too loose to handle and that is exactly right. vegetarian.
• Magiritsa, sourced from Greece. A lamb offal soup thickened with egg and lemon, where the offal is blanched twice before it is allowed near the broth. Lamb, Egg.
• Melomakarona, sourced from Greece. Oil-based biscuits dunked hot into cold syrup, where the temperature difference is the only thing that gets the honey inside them. vegetarian.
• Moussaka, sourced from Greece. Aubergine, a dry spiced mince and a thick béchamel in layers, where every layer is cooked dry before it is built. Lamb, Egg.
• Pastafrola, sourced from Greece. A soft biscuit-dough tart with a lattice on top, where the dough is handled as little as possible and the jam is boiled down first. Egg, vegetarian.
• Pasteli, sourced from Greece. Two ingredients boiled to a precise temperature and cut while hot, where the thermometer is the whole recipe. vegetarian.
• Pastitsada, sourced from Greece. A long braise carrying far more clove and cinnamon than seems sensible, served over thick hollow pasta cooked separately. Beef.
• Pastitsio, sourced from Greece. Long tubes laid the same way in a dish under a spiced mince and a set béchamel, with no vegetable in it anywhere. Beef, Egg.
• Paximathia, sourced from Greece. Bread baked once as a loaf and a second time as slices, until it is hard enough to keep for months. vegan.
• Pita, sourced from Greece. A soft flatbread with no pocket in it, cooked in a dry pan rather than an oven so it stays foldable. vegetarian.
• Portokalopita, sourced from Greece. A cake with no flour in it at all, built from filo dried out and torn into shreds, then soaked in orange syrup. Egg, vegetarian.
• Psarosoupa, sourced from Greece. One large fish poached whole and lifted out intact, with the broth it leaves behind finished with egg and lemon. Fish, Egg.
• Saganaki, sourced from Greece. A slab of hard cheese floured and fried for ninety seconds a side, which is the entire window it has.
• Salt Cod in Batter, sourced from Greece. Salt cod soaked for two days with the water changed six times, then fried in a beer batter and eaten with garlic sauce. Fish.
• Skordalia, sourced from Greece. Garlic pounded into potato with oil beaten in, where the potato must be worked by hand or it turns to glue. vegan.
• Sofrito, sourced from Greece. Thin veal slices in a pale garlic and vinegar sauce with no tomato in it at all, which is what makes it this rather than a stew. Beef, Veal.
• Souvla, sourced from Greece. Fist-sized pieces of lamb turned slowly over embers for hours, which is a different method from the small skewers it shares a root with. Lamb.
• Souvlaki, sourced from Greece. Cubes of pork on skewers with a marinade that has no acid in it until the end, so the meat does not go chalky before it reaches the fire. Pork.
• Spanakopita, sourced from Greece. A filo pie whose filling is wrung out in a cloth before it goes anywhere near the pastry. Egg.
• Spanakorizo, sourced from Greece. Spinach and rice cooked in one pan where the spinach water is the cooking liquid and nothing else is added. vegan.
• Stifado, sourced from Greece. A beef stew carrying as much weight in whole small onions as in meat, with the onions left whole and never stirred. Beef.
• Strapatsada, sourced from Greece. Eggs scrambled INTO a reduced tomato rather than cooked beside it, so the whole pan is one colour. Egg.
• Stuffed Peppers, sourced from Greece. Peppers and tomatoes filled with half-cooked rice and baked on potatoes that catch the juices. vegan.
• Tahinopita, sourced from Greece. A coiled sweet bread with tahini rolled through it, made with no dairy and no egg at all. vegan.
• Taramasalata, sourced from Greece. An emulsion built like a mayonnaise, where the oil goes in drop by drop and the colour is ivory rather than pink. Fish.
• Tirokafteri, sourced from Greece. Feta whipped with a roasted pepper and chilli, which is not an emulsion and is the only dip here a machine actually helps.
• Tiropita, sourced from Greece. A cheese pie whose filling is loosened with egg and milk, because feta alone bakes into a dry salty brick. Egg.
• Tomatokeftedes, sourced from Greece. Tomato fritters held together by flour alone, with no egg and no binder, where the batter is mixed at the last possible moment. vegan.
• Trahanas, sourced from Greece. Flour and soured milk cooked to a paste, dried hard over several days and broken into grains that keep for a year. vegetarian.
• Tsoureki, sourced from Greece. An enriched braided bread that pulls apart in strands, risen three times and scented with two things nothing else uses. Egg, vegetarian.
• Tzatziki, sourced from Greece. Strained yoghurt with cucumber squeezed dry, where every step is about taking water out before it can thin the bowl. vegetarian.
• Vasilopita, sourced from Greece. An orange butter cake with a wrapped coin baked into it, where the coin goes in from underneath after the batter is in the tin. Egg, vegetarian.
• Yahni, sourced from Greece. Beans cooked in oil and tomato until they are soft right through, which is deliberate and is not overcooking. vegan.

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