Tzatziki is a popular Greek sauce that is often used as a dip with pita bread or enjoyed with various types of meat dishes such as souvlaki and gyros. It is best made with yogurt, but if you prefer not to use yogurt you may substitute it for sour cream.
Baklava is one of the most popular Greek desserts known around the world, but there are also many different ways of preparing this wonderful and decedent sweet. In this video recipe, Eva shows us how to prepare baklava rolls. The ingredients are the same as the traditional baklava recipe, but here the phyllo is rolled and cut into individual pieces.
Kourabiedes are a traditional Greek cookie made for special occasions like Christmas. They are butter cookies covered with icing sugar and are a favourite among Greeks. This recipe makes a huge amount of cookies (about 8 dozen), so feel free to cut the recipe in half or simply give them away to loved ones as gifts!
Diples are a wonderful Greek dessert to make on special occasions. The dough is rolled into long, thin strips, fried in hot oil and then dipped in syrup. It is best to prepare and fry the dough a couple of days before you add the syrup. Frying the diples takes a bit of practice, but once you become more experienced you might try frying the diples in fancy shapes.
This is the perfect meal to make on a weekend afternoon. It is simple and healthy and fills the house with wonderful smell. Add a side of salad and it is perfect for family gatherings!
This is a nutritious and wonderfully satisfying vegetarian dish. The name ‘yiyantes’ comes from the Greek word for giant (‘giant beans’). Yiyantes can be cooked a couple of different ways, and in this recipe Eva shows us how to prepare these giant beans in tomato juice baked in the oven (plaki-style).
The ninth video is up on ThursdayForDinner.com with Dipali showing how to make Cabbage Sambharo or Warm Spiced Cabbage Salad. Cabbage Sambharo is a Gujarati side dish similar in look and feel to coleslaw or salad. Visit Thursday for Dinner for the full recipe.
Pastitsio is a layered pasta casserole, also known as “Macaronia tou Fournou” (pasta cooked in the oven). It is a very popular dish throughout Greece and is the perfect dish to make for a large family gathering or party, as it yields a large number of pieces. Pastitsio consists of layers of pasta, a layer of ground beef, and a thick béchamel sauce.
Moussaka is a layered casserole made with layers of eggplant, meat, and a béchamel sauce. In this video, Eva shows us her slightly healthier take on this classic Greek dish. Rather than frying the eggplant, Eva broils the sliced eggplant in the oven for 10 minutes on each side. Her recipe also calls for sliced potatoes to serve as the base of the dish along with the eggplant.
Moog dal is a traditional Indian lentil soup. Moog dal is the main ingredient in the soup, hence the name. However, you can add other types of lentils such as, masoor dal, val dal and chora dal, as we do below. In different parts of India, this dal is made differently. In the north, it is made to have a much thicker texture. Today we will be making it Gujarati style, which means it is more like a soup.
The fifth video is up on Thursday for Dinner titled The Perfect Biscotti. Biscotti is one of those perfect desserts that go so well with a Greek coffee or espresso shot. An Italian cookie twice-baked, what more could you ask for?
Biscotti is an Italian cookie which is twice-baked. It makes a wonderful snack and is a great accompaniment to coffee, tea or wine. It is a light and textured cookie and makes a great alternative to the more sugary cookies available at the local supermarket. With biscotti you can really experiment with the ingredients: you can add chocolate chips, any time of nut, and even dried fruit like cranberries. Here Eva shows us her recipe for biscotti. We’ve tried many different biscotti recipes and found this one to be the best.
Greek coffee is both delicious and mysterious! It is a wonderful drink to serve your house guests, but also provides a window into your past, present and future…well, apparently, but we’re not quite sure. Greek coffee is quite strong and is served with the foam at the top and the grounds at the bottom of the cup. It is made using a small pot, called a briki in Greek, and is sweetened according to taste: bitter, medium, sweet, or very sweet….
The third video is up on Thursday for Dinner titled Eva’s Delicious Dolmathes. Aside from the fact that the recipe involves rolling and stuffing grapevine leaves, the really interesting part is the sauce my mom makes at the end. Most people would simply roll the Dolmathes and leave it at that, but the real taste, the part which makes the dolmathes unforgettable is all the end of the video.
Dolmathes, also known as stuffed grapevine leaves, are a Greek specialty. There are many different variations of this dish, depending on the region of Greece. Some prepare it with an avgolemono (egg and lemon) sauce, others prefer a tomato sauce. Some Greeks cook the dolmathes in a pan in the oven, while others prefer to cook the dolmathes on the stovetop. In this recipe Eva shows us her unique way of preparing this classic Greek dish.
Tyropita are delicious Greek pastries made with feta or ricotta cheese (or a combination of both) wrapped in layers of buttered phyllo. Tyropita are great as a snack or as a side dish for lunch or dinner, although in Greece they are usually eaten as a breakfast food. What I love about tyropita is that you can make a large batch and then freeze them. Take some out of the freezer about 40 minutes before dinner, pop them in the oven, and you’ll have a wonderful side dish for the family meal.
Last January I was in Italy with my girlfriend and we got talking about how we would remember all the classic dishes of our culture. That conversation planted a seed in our minds and earlier this summer we got to recording a bunch of different recipes. I’m proud to say we have launched our pet project ThursdayForDinner.com. The videos, as to be expected early on, are rough around the edges – but they achieve their purpose (and they’ll get better). As the site says:
Thursday for Dinner is a video blog dedicated to preserving family recipes. Our mission is to capture our family’s most treasured recipes and make them available to everyone.
