A evening in Athens

Everytime I come back from university I fall in love with Athens all over again. You can get lost in all the nooks and crannies of Thisseio, Plaka, Psiri and never come across the same shop, the same art mural, the same cafeteria, there are just endless things to see and do. You can listen to the various buskers playing a jazzy, upbeat song or admire the Acropolis while nibbling on some nuts, bought from an old Greek man off the side of the street.
One thing I love about Greece is the culture of going out for a coffee and sitting there, chatting for hours on end. Greeks love their coffee and especially during the summer, they love their ice-cold frappe. You can go out any time of the day and you will struggle to find a place to sit down and have a drink. It's always at this time that I wonder "don't these people have jobs?", no wonder Greece is feeling the burn of the economic crisis. Walking down the pedestrianized pathway that leads you from the Acropolis area down to Thisseio, the road is paved with cafeterias. Row after row, table after table, cafe after cafe. For a second I was taken aback with the abundance of these coffe shops, but then it hit me, this is what we Greeks do, this is what we are famous for: sitting and lazing around, drinking endless amounts of coffee without a care in the world of what one should really be doing or what time of day it is. But that's what I love about the Greek νοωτροπία (way of thinking), they live a casual, carefree life. Especially in the summer, we wake up late, feast on lovely fresh melon and peaches all day, lounge by the sea and then decide to head off for dinner around 10 in the evening. What a life, eh?

Chocolate

If there is one thing I can't live without it's chocolate.
I have great will power but I struggle to go three days without a tiny hit of cocoa from a shop bought chocolate bar. To hell with all this fancy pants Swiss or French chocolate, I tend to like all dark chocolate. I hate to admit, all foodies should look away now, but I have to say that Somerfields' own brand, dark chocolate is great. At 40 pence a bar (yes, 40 p a bar!) you get all the great taste of rich cocoa and the great crisp sound when you break off a piece( or five) without the bitterness and without the horrible grainyness you get from other cheap chocolates. I even like Cadbury's Bournville dark chocolate and ASDA's own brand-dark chocolate. Maybe my preference for cheap chocolate comes with being a student, but I have tried many chocolates, from Gold & Blacks to Fair Trade and I will always go back to Bournville or good old Sommerfields.
However I will never turn down a bar of "good quality dark chocolate" . When I'm at uni and I want to have a square of chocolate after dinner I go for the cheap stuff . But when I bake with it and make brownies or chocolate chip cookies, I will definetly use a better quality chocolate, or whatever I can find in Asda that is a bit more expensive than 40p bar.

Apple Crumble Cake

Seeing as apples are at their best in February there is still an abundances of this great fruit around. Take advantage of this time and bake this amazing apple cake. Indeed this recipe is amazing, but the crumble topping does just take it from being a dull apple cake to a an absolutely delicious dessert.

Apple Crumble Cake

175g unsalted butter
150g sugar
4 apples (peeled, cored and sliced into thin wedges)
3 eggs
200g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder

150g creme fraiche ( I used reduced fat ; plain Greek (Total) yogurt could also be used)
zest of a lemon
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 tbsp honey or maple syrup

For the crumble topping:
80g almonds, finely chopped (can use hazelnuts or walnuts)
50g butter
50g brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
75g plain flour

1)Butter and line a 20/23 cm round tin.
2)For the crumble topping: melt the butter and mix in the brown sugar, cinnamon, flour and chopped nuts.
3) In a pan heat 25g of butter with 1tbsp of sugar and add the apple wedges. Cook these for about 10-15 minutes until they are tender and turn a lovely golden colour.
4) For the cake: cream the remaining butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Then add the eggs one at a time( if the mixture looks like it may curdle, simply add 1tbsp of flour to the mixture).
5) Fold the flour, lemon zest, cinnamon and baking powder to the butter mixture. 6) Add the creme fraiche and mix together till you have a smooth batter.
7) Spoon about 2/3 of the cake mixture into the tin and spread it level, then sprinkle over about 1/3 of the crumble mix.
8) Pour in the remaining cake batter and top with a light layer of the crumble mix. Top this off with the apple slices, arranged neatly, and finally scatter the remaining crumble mixture over the top. If you want you could sprinkle over an extra tablespoon or two of almonds, to give the cake extra crunch.
9) Bake at 180C/ gas 4 for an hour and a half. If the cake seems to be getting brown too quickly, simply cover the top with a sheet of aluminium foil or baking parchment.
10) Once the cake has cooled for 10 minutes, heat the honey or maple syrup and drizzle over the top.

Mincemeat and Marzipan Cake

It always seems that after Christmas, no matter how many mince pies you make there is always a little bit of mincemeat left over. So here is an amazing cake recipe that will help you get rid of that half filled jar of mincemeat that's sitting at the back of your fridge. I am not necessarily a great fan of mincemeat or marzipan but this cake doesn't particularly taste strongly of either ingredients. They just simply give this loaf cake a lovely moist texture.


Mincemeat and Marzipan Cake

- 200g self raising flour
- 100g cold butter, cut into little pieces
- 85g light brown sugar
- 85g marzipan, cut into little 1 cm cubed pieces
- 2 eggs
- 2 tbsp flaked almonds
- 300g mincemeat

Tin: 1kg/2lb loaf tin - greased and lined

1) Tip the flour into a bowl, add the cold butter and rub together until the mixture resembles bread crumbs. Alternatively you can blitz them together in the food processor.
2) Stir the sugar and marzipan into the flour mixture.
3) In another bowl, whisk the eggs and then stir in the mincemeat. Then stir this into the flour mixture until everything is evenly combined.
4) Spoon the mixture into the greased loaf tin and sprinkle the almonds on top.
5) Bake at 180C for 1 hour or until the cake has risen and has turned a lovely golden brown.
6) Allow to cool before you take it out of its tin.

Enjoy a slice of this moist cake as a snack, with a nice cup of tea.

Pancake Galore

I know it's a bit late to be posting a recipe about pancakes seeing as it was Shrove Tuesday yesterday. But I'm sure that after yesterday we have all realised that we need to be making them more often. So here is a recipe for those light and fluffy American style pancakes.

American Pancakes

-2 cups plain flour
-2 1/2 cups buttermilk ( or simply use 1 part Greek yogurt to 1 part milk, to make up the required amount)
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1 tsp vanilla essence (optional)

1) Sieve all the dry ingredients together into a large bowl.
2) Separate the eggs, mix the egg yolks with the buttermilk and vanilla.
3) Whisk the egg whites with a pinch of salt.
4) Mix the wet ingredients with the flour mixture.
5) Lastly fold the egg whites into the batter.
6) Heat a frying pan and grease with a little oil or butter. These are American pancakes so you only want to pour in enough batter to make a small circle. Cook for 1-2 minutes until the mixture begins to set and bubble slightly. Then flip over and leave to cook for another minute.

If the pancake batter is a bit too thick and is cooking a lot faster on the bottom side than on top, just thin the mixture out by adding a bit more milk until you are happy with the consistency.

As awful as it sounds I like to enjoy these pancakes with chocolate spread and golden syrup, (together), delicious!

Clean Monday - Καθαρή Δευτέρα

Today in Greece, we celebrate what is called Καθαρή Δευτέρα (pronouned kathari deftera). Also known as Clean Monday and Ash Monday, it marks the first day of the Christian Orthodox lent. This traditional day is a bank holiday in Greece and so families are able to gather together and feast upon a great meat-free meal.
Only on this day of the year a special type of bread is baked and sold by the vast number of bakeries in Greece. It is called 'lagana', and is simply a large loaf of bread which contains no yeast and so is very thin and has sesame seeds sprinkled over the top. Every year my dad and I would go to the bakery early in the morning and get 10 of these. They would be piled up in large baskets, and you could ask for softer ones or ones which had been baked for longer and so were a lot crispier. They would then wrap them in paper and place them in a bag for you. Without fail, on the way home my dad and I would always break off a few chunks of the warm, crusty bread to nibble on till we got home.
Another tradition which children and adults of all ages engage in on this day is kite flying. People set out little stalls all along the streets and pavements and sell kites of all different colours and patterns. You begin to see kites in the sky from about miday and as it gets later you can count hundreds of them.

The food menu on this holy day is endless. My grandmother (and all other women of the family) spend days preparing for this glorious feast. The dishes you typically see served on this day include:
-taramosalata - a dip made from fish roe
-φάβα (fava) - a dip made from split peas
-γίγαντες - broad beans with a tomato sauce baked in the oven
- fish
- squid and octopus
all obviously accompanied by the lagana bread.

Then usually for desert there are a number of things to choose from, as in the Greek culuture if you are visiting someone you will always take something with you. So on this day all the guests tend to bring a desert they have bought from one of the hundreds of pastry shops (zaharoplastia-ζαχαροπλαστία) dotted around.
However the traditional desert for this day is χαλβά, halva. This is a sweet, dense confection. There are two types, the most common one is made from tahini (sesame paste) whereas as the other (χαλβά φαρσάλων) is slightly more gelatinous and is made from semolina and flour. Other ingredients are added such as pistachios or almonds. The most common type comes in different flavours as well, you can get plain, vanilla or chocolate or a mix. My personal favourite is the vanilla halva with almonds.
Over all this is a great day for everyone. Friends and families come together and celebrate the start of lent with a great meal along with a great atmosphere.

Cream Tea

Last weekend a couple of my closest friends and I met up and spent a lovely weekend together at my friend's apartment in Earls Court. We woke up on Saturday morning and thought it would be a great idea to walk to the Kensington Palace Gardens. We had a 'hearty' breakfast of cereal and set off for the day.
The weather wasn't great but every now and then we did get a few lovely, golden rays of sun warming our cold skin. The grounds of the palace were amazing, all lush and green. With people out for their morning jog and families walking their dogs and pushing their babies around in their prams.

We had been walking around for a couple of hours when we decided we had had enough of the cold and decided to find somewhere for a drink. One of my friends had mentioned earlier that there was a tea room somewhere on the grounds, so we headed there.

We reached our destination and were guided through the tea room to a table for four. The tea room was amazing. All pristine and white inside. Each table had a little plant pot in the centre which appeared to be a mini orange tree, wisely chosen after the name of the tea room, 'The Orangery'. As the hostess guided us to our table we passed the centre piece of the room. An array of cakes and scones were neatly presented on a large table. There was a carrot cake, coffee and walnut cake, a lemon loaf cake, fruit scones, cheese scones, an Orangery cake, a tart of some sort and a selection of cupcakes. They all looked mouth-wateringly good.

We all decided to treat ourselves and go the whole hog; a scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam, one of my friends was the exception and ordered a piece of carrot cake (but later ate half of my scone as well). The scones were light and fluffy, and tasted absolutely divine with the rich, velvety cream and ruby red jam. Simply amazing!

I would suggest anyone go there if they are out in London and want to treat them selves to a little guilty pleasure.