Evangelistria Monastiraki

(Palamidi)

The big white monastery on the hill next to Palamidi, the Venetian fortress keeping guard over Nafplion, always seems to glisten in the sun from anywhere in town. Maybe it's the mosaics of biblical scenes catching the light that greet you from either side of the front door. Standing in the large front courtyard, one could be distracted here for an hour before ever going inside, held by the stunning views over the red-tiled rooftops of the Old and New Towns, out to the bay and beyond.

If possible, the view becomes even more picturesque by the small bell tower perched on the edge of the parking lot between the church and its precipice. The details of the church interior itself, beyond the mosaics and the front door, are a lost memory to me. It's most likely hiding in one of the trillions of unmarked boxes of similar lost memories in that ludicrously large and ever-growing warehouse in my mind which somewhere holds the true chronology of my fragmented childhood and the exact shade of my grandmother's eyes.

(Evangelistria)

What holds firm in my mind is the long, narrow room next to the chapel's entrance, an open door at one end inviting you in... if you're not afraid of flickering darkness. Built against the rock, the back wall is a series of natural boulders. You realize as you enter that it's not truly dark but lit by candles lovingly placed along the stone ledges covered with countless icons of the beloved Mary and her son. The candlelight bestows magic on them...or is that just their own magical quality that enthralls much of our planet?

St. George is here also, ever-slaying the formidable dragon as in every church and altar across modern Greece. I've visited this stone altar several times and each time with the same sense of awe. Maybe it's the natural stone contours that slope down into the long narrow chamber. Maybe it's the care and prayer with which the "room" glows with candles lit by loving hands and those icons of Mary and Jesus standing upright along the boulder's craggy dips and ledges.

                            (Mosaics)

That awed feeling is reproduced from anywhere I can see the monastery in town, from where we sit eating lunch in the New Town's "Take Out Chicken Place", so called by us because the sign is all in Greek leaving us no idea how to describe it when recommending or trying to decide on a lunch venue. That feeling is reproduced as I sit in warm sunshine at its sidewalk tables in front of one of the New Town's three busiest roadways. I can see the monastery looking across the street and over the top of a massive skeleton of a bare-bones building never finished, these which endlessly dot modern Greece's urban and rural landscapes alike. Up the hill to the white monastiraki, the flickering dark-light altar haunts me...even while I consume roasted chicken and potato rounds layered in devilishly-creamy lemon gravy, Ed's favorite sweet cabbage salad, wilted wild greens picked by Greek women and my favorite Greek salad with tzatziki... all washed down with a crisp, tender white wine of the region. The magic of that altar beams at me from the mosaics glinting in the sun... which spills into the food on my plate... which spills into me... which infiltrates my thoughts. That magic makes my very cells seem to shimmer with the beauty of it. Or is that the wine?

I watch the monastiraki for as long as I can see it on our walk home. We dodge the New Town's typical Greek traffic which has very few rules beyond the main rule of "Me First". As we walk, we contemplate an after-lunch nap...Or a walk around the bottom of  akronafplia from one end of the Old Town to the other...Or a trip to our favorite bakery for the dark-brown bread sticks rolled in sunflower seeds which we'll have for dinner later with a piece of fruit after our decadent (and huge) lunch...Or a drive out to the tiny white and blue church along the water's cliff side. Here, past Evangelistria and beyond the big beach a few miles outside of town, down a short trail past the parking lot and in another dark chapel overlooking the sea, St. George is again saving the day. I don't have to be afraid of flickering dark-light...because I know that at every such altar, St. George will be there.

(Photos copyright: Kirsten Steen)

Pacific Seafood endangered?

We're not eating much seafood these days 

after recently reading a blog about the frightening and so-far unexplained carnage

of Pacific ocean seafood and wildlife

(possibly due to radiation from Fukushima.) 

I've read several different articles

from Oceana, NOAA and even the FDA's faq's

but so far, not feeling assured

especially after witnessing my own bizarre scene of wildlife carnage

on the beach at Manzanita last month.

I love seafood and am missing it.

So I'm enjoying photos of fresh fish from Greece's Mediterranean. 

What are your thoughts about radiation

from Fukushima

reaching our seafood?

(photo copyright: Kirsten Steen)

Greek Market Olives~Travelin' Tuesday

I love the color of olives, ripe and unripe. 

These are from the outdoor market under the Palamidi fortress in Nafplion, Greece,

a little tourist destination two hours south of Athens on the Peloponnese.
These would go perfect with some sliced cucumber and tomato,
feta cheese and olive oil.
And a little Greek sunshine.
We finally have some sun here this week.
Hope you are enjoying whatever you've got.
Happy Tuesday!

Tastes of the Mediterranean

Oregon is stunning
during the summer and
fall months and while it is
THE best time to be here,
having been more home-bound
this past year, I am missing the
sights, smells and tastes of
the Mediterranean~
specifically Greece.
Give me those white-washed walls,
churches and walkways,
the dusty sweetness of wild rosemary
and thyme on the warm breeze--
and TZATZIKI!




I'm a sucker for those Greek salads with shiny, fresh peppers, tomatoes and cucumber and huge blocks of feta cheese sprinkled with lemon juice. The thick, rich local olive oil can be purchased in large, plastic jugs at small road-side farm stands. (FYI: These stands are also an inexpensive way to buy the local wine. And yes, also in plastic jugs!)


Every meal for me must be accompanied with the simple but inspiring tzatziki--the tangy yogurt and cucumber dip with plenty of garlic. While Ed sometimes tires of it, I can never get enough, slathering it on my bread, salad and every kind of meat. He often suggests we try something new in place of it while I suggest we try something else to accompany it.



What a Greek menu calls a salad can also be a pureed vegetable mixed with garlic. Eggplant salad (melitzanosalata) consists of blended eggplant, olive oil, lemon, yogurt and garlic while Fava salad uses pureed split peas and onion with garlic and fresh oregano. Greece's famous garlic dip (skordalia) can be made with garlic, almonds, lemon and olive oil including bread crumbs and/or mashed potato. One feels just a bit foolish at first smearing potato on bread but once tasted, that feeling dissipates. And like the tzatziki, it goes well on vegetables, fish and red meats.

Ed prefers the hefty, meat-filled dishes like Stifado--a thick beef and pearl onion casserole, Pastitsio--baked pasta with a spicy meat sauce-- and any braised meat dish with the local olive oil, herbs and spices. My favorite dishes are of the lighter fare: salads, fresh fish, the local greens, souvlaki--chicken kabobs with yogurt sauce--and octopus spritzed with lemon and dipped in tzatziki.

Octopus, when done well, is fare for the Gods here thanks to the age-old tenderizing process we've witnessed in several Greek ports: leathery hands and face hunched over a rock, cigarette with its long ash dangling from his lips, the fisherman slams the hopefully already-dead critter against the rock or cement--over and over, maybe to make sure there are no brains left. Octopus in the States (and even in some of the more touristy Greek restaurants) can be rubbery and chewy but when cooked right after this relentless texturizing process, is tender, moist and divine.

Anchovy and sardines are fish I rarely touch in the States but served fresh in Greece, yield an entirely different experience. And while I've never been a fan of okra, I am now a convert after tasting braised okra with tomato, onion and garlic at a little Plaka restaurant in Athens. One might think it was just a case of grateful tastebuds after a long day treading in the ancient footsteps of theater performers and goddess-worshipers but having now tried the dish in several Greek locations, I am a dedicated follower.

In Nafplion, where we like to spend time with friends, most of the best fish restaurants are out of the town, away from the touristy areas and a short drive to nearby beaches. In Greece, the fish is to be eaten whole, heads and all.











Been there & done that--but after consuming my share of fish brains (just enough to say I've eaten like a local!),




I prefer to leave them for the school of cats that endlessly hang around every eatery waiting for just such a morsel.


The French find that Greek cooking leaves something to be desired but for me that something is encapsulated in the magic of every day in Greece; in walking ancient archaeological sites; pondering lives long turned to dust; traditions and cultures barely known to us; scents and tastes married to a harsh but exquisitely beautiful land albeit a beauty in which one must frequently overlook the blight of man.






But the taste
is on the wind.
It grows in groves,
in the wild mountain greens
and rocky hillsides
and it feeds
on the view,
overlooking the waves
of endless
mythological lives.









Photographs copyright: Kirsten Steen