Amy Riolo's Blog: #GreekDinner Around the World

"No one harms a cook and gets away with it, for our craft is sacred to the gods!"

From the Ancient Greek comedy "Dyskolos"

I have been mesmerized by the Greek culture ever since I was a child. My own ancestral homeland of Calabria, Italy, and much of southern Italy, was once a Greek colony, and in antiquity shared a great deal with their neighbors across the Ionian Sea. Many of the communities there still hold annual Greek festivals, and a few of the residents speak Griko, a Italiot –Greek dialect . Also known as “Calabrian Greek” – the dialect is listed in UNESCO’s Red Book of endangered languages. After extensive research, I learned that the Greeks which were brought to populate Southern Italy hailed predominately from the island of Rhodes. I did, in fact, find a restaurant in Rhodes that had the same name as my mother’s maiden name.

When I was growing up, we lived next door to my grandfather and step-grandmother (whom I referred to as YiaYia) and whose family hailed from Nafpaktos, a beautiful Byzantine town in Greece. I was exposed to just as many Greek cultural, religious, and culinary traditions as I was Italian. For those reasons, it gives me great pleasure to participate in #GreekDinner Around the World – a virtual celebration of Hellenistic cultural and culinary heritage. Please join me in sharing your favorites and comments on social media all day (and night) long.

A very brief history of Greek cuisine:

Many of the same dishes that are prepared in Greek kitchens today originated in antiquity. Greek philosophers often left written accounts about the food of the day. Even Greek mythology provides a glimpse into the culinary worlds of the ancients. Consider the God Zeus, for example, who slept on a bed made out of saffron. Saffron is still the world’s most expensive spice despite the fact that transportation costs much less, due to the fact that it takes 70,000 saffron crocuses to make up one pound of the spice. In antiquity it was imported from Arabia. One can only imagine how much would have cost to fill an entire bed with it!

The culinary history of Greece was linked very closely with that of Ancient Egypt. According to Herodotus, King Amasis of Egypt (569-525 BCE) loved the Greeks. He demonstrated his affections for the Greeks by building them a city called Naucratis in Egypt. Alexander the Great was appointed to the Egyptian throne by the priests of Ancient Memphis. In 332 BCE, Alexander founded a city on Egypt’s northern Mediterranean coast and called it Alexandria. This new port opened up trade and communications between Egypt and Greece. Shortly after Alexander founded Alexandria, he was killed. A member of his army, named Ptolemy I, became the ruler of Egypt and began a new dynasty which ruled Egypt for three centuries. Although the Ptolemaic rulers were all Greek, they assimilated into Egyptian culture and Greek styles of daily living became heavily influenced by Egypt. Music, dancing, art, legal systems, and business trends were exchanged. To this day, many similar dishes are proud components of both Greek and Egyptian cuisine.

The lavish Turkish cuisine of the Ottoman Empire also influenced Greek appetizers pastries a great deal. Greek cooks often held high positions in Ottoman palace kitchens and, as a result, some Greek dishes share derivatives of Turkish names, ingredients, and cooking styles, and vice versa. Greek appetizers, for example, are called mezedes, a Hellenistic twist on the Turkish meze. They are largely based upon healthy ingredients like tomatoes, bell peppers, olives, cheeses, eggplants, beans, and seafood. An amazing array of similar appetizers, baklavas, kataifis, cookies, and cakes are proud components of both countries today.

Greeks were present in America since the first settlers arrived. Most immigrants came during late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Between 1871 and 1930 more than 400,000 Greeks arrived. The peak year was 1907 which was 100 years ago. Greeks utilized labor agents to arrange passage and jobs. Initially, they found jobs doing physical labor in large cities. Many of the immigrants came from small coastal and mainland villages and the large cities were every bit as foreign to them as the new country was.

Coffee houses, Greek-language newspapers, and Greek Orthodox churches became integral to the culture of the Greek community. The first wave of immigrants were largely groups of men and Greek cuisine was a luxury which they were unprepared to duplicate in their new cities. Slowly the women began arriving, either to join family member or as contracted brides. They brought the traditional recipes as well as the arts of daily living with them.

Greeks began leaving their physical labor jobs and began opening restaurants and stores. Many of the other immigrant groups preferred working for steady, albeit meager wages, but the Greeks chose businesses. Studies are currently being done to understand what pushed the Greeks to take the risk of leaving salaried jobs for entrepreneurship (which were often successful) when they had no business skills to begin with. I personally believe that it is because they noticed the niche market for Greek cuisine which could not be imported or prepared by anyone other than Greeks because of the language. There was also a real “need” for Greek cuisine because it was so different from the meat & potatoes diet which was popular at the time.

Little by little, the businesses began clustering together and Greektowns were born in America. By 1910 Chicago had the largest Greek town in the nation. Greeks began serving and selling Greek recipes which could be made with the local and imported goods that were available. Often simple, easy to reproduce recipes were favored instead of ones with complicated instructions, because people came with the recipes that they could remember. The entrepreneurs became so successful that they took control of Chicago’s wholesale and retail food industry.

By the mid 20^th century, Greeks, many of them 2^nd and 3^rd generation Americans, along with other Americans, made the decision to move outside of the city. In the suburbs, the Greek Orthodox church became the heart of Greek social life. As a way to raise funds, and deepen ties within the community, Greek Orthodox churches began to hold annual festivals and serve traditional Greek festival food which could be easily feed large quantities of people.

Here are some of my favorite traditional and modern Greek recipes:

My Greek Dinner Menu:

Cheese and Herb Filled Phyllo Triangles