A's Top 10 Food Memories of 2011

2011 was a hard year to peg for "top food memories" for me. Sadly we didn't do anything overly remarkable outside of our trip to Europe, and I think that's reflected a bit in my choices. Aside from the 6 items from that trip that are listed, I had at least 5 others that were maybes that just missed the cut. I may add pictures of the dishes later, but right now I haven't prepared that. So in random order, here are my top 10 food memories from 2011!

Tzitzikas Salad from Tzitzikas kai Mermigas
This salad was part of our first full meal in Greece, and it was such a fresh and delicious salad. So much of our trip stands out with regards to food we ate, but this was the start of our adventure, and it also was really healthy and really tasty.

Mushroom Pie from Ariston
A rich, buttery, flaky crust on both sides surrounding garlic and butter sauteed mushrooms. If the thought of that doesn't make your mouth water, you probably shouldn't read this blog anymore. No, I'm serious, just leave now. Ariston is a well known bakery in Athens, and of all of the pies we tried, this was my favorite. The crust was similar with most of the pies that they offered, but the mushroom filling was just amazing. A little buttery, a little garlicky, and unbelievably moist.

Mercimek Kofte from Antalia
It's not a stretch to say that M and I order in a lot. M orders more than I do due to her work schedule, but we both do order from time to time. One thing that we both fell in love with was the Mercimek Kofte from Antalia. It's a kofte made out of red lentils, and it is unbelievable. The first time M ordered it, she used all of her will power to not finish eating it all and actually save me some. Since that time, she has never saved a single bite for me, but we've ordered it together so that I've been able to eat it more.

Fish from Kounelas
We've had a lot of fresh fish, but this was something different. It was a simple preparation of being grilled over a wood-fire grill seasoned with salt, pepper, olive oil, and lemon. It was such a fresh and tasty preparation, and the fish was excellent. It was our last meal in Mykonos, and it was the perfect end to that leg of our trip.

Stuffed Vegetables from Lefteris
Lefteris is a restaurant in the small village of Apiranthos on the island of Naxos. You need to rent a car to get there, and it's a long and winding mountain drive to get there. But it's totally worth it. The food is extremely fresh since it's all grown in the garden just downstairs from the actual restaurant. The stuffed vegetables were literally picked that morning, and you could taste the freshness. While I doubt we'd ever make that drive again, we're so glad we did it this time to have that great meal.

Chicken and Tomatoes in Balsamic sauce from Homemade
This may not have been the greatest dish ever cooked, but it was special to me. I made this at home, and it was a tasty dish in my opinion. This was the first dish that we made out of the cookbooks we received from our wedding, and we were very excited about it.

Loucoumades from Regina Rose Amat
Loucoumades are Greek pastries that are made of fried dough and soaked in honey and cinnamon. They're round balls, but they're not like little donut holes like you'd fine here in the US. They're light and chewy with a good bite to them. I've had loucoumades before here in the states, but this little store in Halki specialized in them. They tasted incredible. They had the perfect texture, the honey was layered perfectly, and they were a great snack on our drive to Apiranthos. What made this even better was that we ate these while relaxing in the shade of a quaint little street in the middle of a small town. The atmosphere was fantastic, and it just felt so relaxing.

Pappardelle Bolognese from Babbo
M and I fell in love with pasta bolognese after our trip to Amsterdam in 2010. We had one of our many "versary" dinners at Babbo, and this was one of the dishes that we got as part of the pasta tasting menu. It was a rich meat sauce with veal, pancetta, and proscuitto. The tomato sauce was balanced and really absorbed a lot of the flavor from the meat.

Crab Toast from abc kitchen
This dish was part of our wedding anniversary dinner so it already had a special place in our hearts. The crab toast is something that is highly recommended at abc kitchen so we had to try it. It's loaded with sweet, succulent crab, and it has just the right amount of citrus from the dollop of lemon aioli on top. What made this meal even more amazing was that, in the middle of it, Chef Jean-George Vongerichten came in for a meal with his family, and his table was right next to ours.

Naxian Potato Salad from Meze Meze
Naxos is known for growing some of the best potatoes in the world. At our first meal at Meze Meze, we ordered way too much food as usual. However, one of the highlights of this meal was the Naxian Potato Salad. Loaded with onions, tomatoes, green peppers, cucumbers, a local cheese called xinomizithra, and obviously boiled potatoes. The salad was loaded with flavor and freshness, and it had just the right amount of creaminess and saltiness from the cheese. It was a great dish, and it stood out even though we ordered 3 or 4 potato dishes and had to roll ourselves home.

Almond Biscuits

On our way from Mykonos to Naxos, we snacked on some almond biscuits that we purchased in Mykonos.


The place we got them from in Mykonos was a family owned establishment, and the interior was filled with pictures of each master baker throughout the years as well as their families.


Their shop had lots of almond products including their special almond bisctuits, Amigthalota.



Amigthalota

Cross section of Amigthalota
Amigthalota is a dessert made with almond meal in place of flour. They are baked and then covered in powdered sugar. The baking process crisps the exterior to offer a nice bite to the dessert while leaving the middle soft and chewy. The powdered sugar exterior adds a bit of extra sweetness that complements the crushed almonds and almond essence.

A recalls having eaten these or something similar earlier in life, but he can't remember where or when this might have been. It could also have been some sort of wild food dream/hallucination, but he's so certain of having had them before. Regardless, it was a treat that he certainly loved having (for the first time?) again while on the boat. M also liked the amigthalota. She particularly liked the soft, chewy interior and found that the biscuits had a hint of lemon flavor. Great snack.

Madoupas

Our last meal in Mykonos was at a place called Madoupas, located along the waterfront. We thought the waterfront would be the perfect pit spot to find a place to eat before continuing on to the old port for our ferry to Naxos.


Madoupas had both indoor and outdoor seating. It was a gorgeous day (unlike the day before), so we decided to sit outside under the screens. We had a table in the "first row" and a truly spectacular view.

View from my seat
Like most other meals, the first thing to arrive was the bread. I don't remember if, at this point, we knew you could decline bread, but we didn't. The bread ended up being the perfect pairing for one of our dishes.


We got the cold appetizer sampler plate, consisting of tzatziki, spicy cheese salad (a spread), fish roe salad (aka taramosalata), stuffed vine leaves and black eyed beans. The bread was great with the different salads/spreads. This was a really good sampler and we liked it better than the other dish we ordered. The vine leaves and black eyed beans salad were good. Of the spreads, we think we liked the spicy cheese one the best but we don't really recall that clearly.


The table next to us had a plate of meatballs covered in tomato sauce that looked and smelled delicious. (They also told us that they were delicious!) We thought we had ordered the same thing but apparently we had gotten plain meatballs with fries. This wasn't bad but we were really looking forward to and expecting the meatballs in tomato sauce. The meatballs had a nice spice and flavoring, but they were fried and a little dry. The other dish was much better.


We weren't expecting a lot from Madoupas, since restaurants in popular locations with amazing views don't always have great food. This wasn't a bad meal but it wasn't the best we had in Mykonos (that award probably goes to Kounelas). After a leisurely meal, it was time to head to the port to go to Naxos!

Last Rochari Breakfast

The next morning we had our last breakfast at the Rochari. Most of the breakfast was the same as the other breakfasts we had there.

A got some coffee.


A got the same hot food as the previous days (they didn't really have a lot of variety) - ham, scrambled eggs and eggs over easy - and this time, a slice of chocolate bread.


Also the usual bowl of yogurt with honey.


Like the other days, I didn't find that much to eat for breakfast again. I got a piece of wheat toast and a few bites of scrambled eggs, and picked up a heart-shaped chocolate chip cookie, which was OK.


Either A or I got a bowl of chocolate cereal. We can't remember whether it was one of us or both of us.


I was looking forward to yogurt with fruit, usually my favorite part of breakfast, but we were eating late and they were out of fruit salad. So I got my yogurt with the chocolate cereal. It was OK but better with fruit.


In general, breakfast at the Rochari wasn't bad. There wasn't a lot of variety in the hot, savory options, but it is a free breakfast (well, included in the room rate) so I can't complain too much about it. It did its job. After our last breakfast at the Rochari, we got ready to check out and leave for our next destination, Naxos. We couldn't wait to see what breakfast at our Naxos hotel would be!

Kounelas

On our first night in Mykonos, we had passed by a fish tavern called Kounelas which had an amusing sign with a rabbit fishing. We really wanted to get some fish before leaving Mykonos so we decided on Kounelas for our last dinner. As we mentioned before, fish seemed really expensive at a lot of places in Mykonos, but Kounelas didn't seem as overpriced and they were busy (always a good sign).


Our meal started out with a bread basket which came with an olive dip. We don't remember much about it right now, but think we liked it.


We also got a bottle of retsina to split. This was like a good white wine and we enjoyed it. It had a bit more bite than most whites we've had before, and that was most likely due to the resin. Neither of us are really wine experts sadly.


We also got a few appetizers. One was the grilled feta cheese stuffed with tomatoes and peppers.


I was expecting blocks of grilled cheese (like saganaki) with tomatoes and peppers inside it (not sure how that would work). What arrived instead was warm grilled cheese with a layer of tomatoes and peppers over it like a salsa. It was delicious. The cheese was nice and gooey, and the tomatoes and peppers added a nice spice and complemented it well.

We also got a salad of rocket, tomato and ksinotyro (a local Mykonian cheese) which was light, healthy and refreshing. I loved salads in Greece because all the ingredients were so fresh and the salads kept us from feeling too weighed down by our meals.


The last appetizer we got was the taramosalata. While this was pretty good, the taramosalata at our hotel snack bar was less fishy and better.


The starring dish of our meal was the fish (not shocking since it is a fish tavern). Most of the fish and seafood at Kounelas was not listed on the menu by price and what you could get depended on the catch of the day. In order to get our main course, A went downstairs to the kitchen where they had him choose an estimated weight/size and then look at the fish in various drawers to choose the one we wanted. We ended up getting a sea bass (about 1/2 kilo), which turned out to be much less expensive than we thought it would be. We really liked how our choice was dictated by the fresh catch. The whole fish was simply grilled in their coal oven and then brought to our table.


Putting into practice the techniques we've learned from watching the waiters at NYC Chinese restaurants, A prepared the fish for our consumption:


The fish was meaty and proved to be more than enough food for dinner along with our 3 appetizers. It was delicious, very clean, flaky and full of flavor even though it was prepared simply with just olive oil, lemon, salt and pepper. We were really happy with our choice.


To close the meal, they dropped off a complimentary bottle of alcohol in an "interesting" shape. We declined since we had just had a whole bottle of retsina. We were, however, amused to watch another couple drinking theirs to the point where they were completely drunk since they felt obligated to drink it. If we had taken part, I'm not sure we would have been awake enough to pack that night.


I think if we had gone to Kounelas earlier in our trip we might have returned there for another dinner. The fish was that good, the prices were reasonable, the atmosphere was casual and relaxed, and the people were nice. This was the type of dinner we had been looking forward to before going to Greece - whole grilled fish and tasty appetizers. We would recommend a visit to Kounelas without hesitation. Excellent fish!

Chicken Stick Pitas

We took the bus back from Paradise Beach and it was a stressful, motion sickness inducing ride. We were so happy to have our feet back on the ground at the bus station and that the bus hadn't gone up in flames before we got there. Our stomachs felt so upset that we needed to settle them with a snack. We could have gone anywhere but we decided to go back to το πηγαδάκι (To Pigadaki) where we had the souvlaki the day before.

Love the delivery bike
Instead of getting the souvlaki snack, we each got the pita with chicken stick:


Each pita came stuffed with the chicken stick, tomato, onion, tzatziki and french fries. It was so good. The grilled chicken stick was just as flavorful and tasty as the day before. Add to that the refreshing tomato, onion and tzatziki, and the starchy (and stomach-calming) fries, and you've got a good sandwich. Adding all of this to the chicken stick only cost 1 additional euro! What a bargain!

We didn't try the other souvlaki places in the Fabrika Square area of Mykonos (by the bus station) so we can't compare, but we would definitely recommend a visit to To Pigadaki/The Little Wishing Well!

Tropicana Club

We decided to visit Paradise Beach on our last full day in Mykonos. Unfortunately that was the one day in Mykonos that the weather decided not to cooperate. Dark clouds, cool temperatures, strong winds - not the ideal day at the beach. Since there isn't much else to do at the beach when the weather isn't great, we stopped in at the Tropicana Club, usually the site of late night beach parties, for lunch.

We each started out with a Mythos (of course) as we relaxed, tried to stay warm and looked at the beach landscape, thinking how beautiful it would be on a nice, sunny, warm day.


We decided to split two dishes for lunch. The first was moussaka.


Moussaka usually consists of eggplant, ground meat, some potatoes and a topping of bechamel sauce and, in this case, grated cheese. It is exactly the type of warm, hearty dish that you want on a cold day. We hadn't gotten it before in Greece, opting instead for lighter salads, but sitting on the beach in the cold wind was the perfect time to get it. This moussaka was really tasty, full of flavor and perfectly cooked. It was creamy but not heavy, and it was very hearty. We were quite happy with it.

We also got the saganaki, which we've mentioned in other posts.


This version of saganaki was more reminiscent of the saganaki we get at home, but not lit on fire. The cheese, of course, is better in Greece, but, like the ones we get here, the saganaki had that nice crusty outer edge and the chewy griddled inside that we love. This was good saganaki.

Generally our trip to Paradise Beach wasn't very fulfilling. We didn't get to walk along the beach or go in the water. We didn't get any sun. We left on the first bus out after lunch with a lot of other visitors who had come to the beach looking for fun and instead found cold. But lunch was good and the scenery was pretty. If only the weather had been better!

Second Rochari Breakfast

Our second breakfast at the Rochari was very similar to the first. There were a few hot options, yogurt and a bunch of cold options.

A's breakfast:

My breakfast was basically the same as my breakfast from the first day. I didn't get a croissant, and I got less scrambled egg, but I think that was because they were running out of it by the time we got there. I got another egg over easy, bacon, ham, and another giant bowl of yogurt with honey.





M's breakfast:

Similar to the first breakfast, I didn't find a ton of things to eat at breakfast. I longed for the hot dog pieces, grape leaves and Greek salad from our breakfast in Athens. But, considering breakfast comes complimentary with the hotel stay, I can't complain too much about it! I got another bowl of Greek yogurt with fruit (more apples and bananas), which was good.


I also picked up a piece of wheat toast (nothing special), marbled bread (fine) and about 2 bites of scrambled eggs, as there wasn't much left. I also got 2 of the fruit jams - I think raspberry and apricot - which were really sweet. Once again, the yogurt and fruit was my favorite part of breakfast.


We had one more breakfast at the Rochari before it was on to our next stop. Would tomorrow's breakfast have different options?

Tzatziki

After our taramosalata snack on the first day, we knew we wanted to try the Rochari snack bar's tzatziki snack as well. Before hitting the pool, we stopped by the snack bar for some tzatziki (which came with a bread basket again) and a Mythos.


The tzatziki, yogurt with cucumber mixed in, was smooth, creamy and refreshing. You could definitely taste the yogurt. Unlike some other spreads, tzatziki is so light and the perfect snack for a hot day.


Later that night, we learned that the snack bar could also do a half-and-half of taramosalata and tzatziki. Even better!


We loved the taramosalata and tzatziki at the Rochari. Unfortunately we didn't have the opportunity to return for more. They were the perfect snacks for our Greek vacation!

το πηγαδάκι

Souvlaki (grilled skewered meat) was one thing we definitely wanted to eat on our Greek vacation. There were a bunch of places in the square near our hotel that had souvlaki so we stopped by after our day trip to Delos. We decided on this place - To Pigadaki (aka The Little Wishing Well) - because it looked (relatively) busy and friendly.


We settled in at one of the tables (with neon green chairs) with an iced tea to wait for our souvlaki.


Souvlaki is a really inexpensive popular fast food in Greece. These were only €1.50 each.


They grilled our chicken souvlaki snack quickly and soon we had this plate of awesome meat:


This chicken souvlaki was so juicy and flavorful. It wasn't dry or chewy at all. It was a great snack for the price. We definitely wanted to return for more!

Strawberry Cookies

We didn't have lunch during our day trip to Delos (hiking all afternoon, big breakfast, more thirsty than hungry), so we had some snacks once we got on the ferry back to Mykonos. We had picked these up at the Bus Station Supermarket near our hotel before going to Delos.


In addition to the pirouline cookies, we had picked up some cookies (seemed like butter cookies, soft and starchy) with strawberry cream filling.


The cookies were rich and the filling was sweet. Kind of like golden oreos with strawberry filling, except much richer. There were so many snacks in Greece that we couldn't try them all, but we were glad to try something like these cookies that we can't get at home!

First Rochari Breakfast

We got an early start on our first full day in Mykonos since we were planning to head out on a day trip to the neighboring island of Delos. We were greeted by a fantastic view from the dining room of the Rochari (our hotel) as we had our complimentary breakfast.

The views from the Rochari are stunning!
M's breakfast:

While there were a lot of options at the Rochari for breakfast, most of them weren't hot or savory options, unlike our breakfast at the Parthenon in Athens.


I ended up choosing a small piece of brown bread (toasted) and scrambled eggs (which were mixed with red peppers). There were a couple of other savory options (ham and other types of eggs) but I'm not a big breakfast eater so the scrambled eggs were the only thing that really interested me from the hot buffet. I also went for our usual Greek yogurt and topped it with a fruit salad made up of green apples, red apples, bananas and strawberries. My favorite part of this breakfast was definitely the yogurt and fruit salad.

A's breakfast:




I got a hearty breakfast with a croissant, some of the aforementioned scrambled eggs, a slice of ham, and an egg over easy. I also got a heaping bowl of yogurt with honey just like every other breakfast I had in Greece. OJ and coffee finished off the meal and got me ready for lots of hiking.

After a big breakfast we were ready for our Delos adventure!