Greece, the Food!
Most Greek salads are very simple: tomatoes, cucumbers, feta, bell peppers, Greek olives, drizzled with olive oil and vinegar and sprinkled with oregano and salt and pepper.
Cookie's younger sister, Joann, owns property on Kos that she rents out to a farmer, so she asked me to connect with him for him to give us some of his produce. He gave us a huge crate filled with the most amazing tomatoes, English cucumbers, zucchini, and miniature eggplant.
So, most days we made Greek salads, minus the raw onions and Greek olives, which neither Wally nor I care for. My sister Niki has asked how can I be Greek and not like olives?? Idk. Maybe it's the other half??
For breakfast most mornings, we walked down to the local bakery and bought fresh bread and bougatsa. Bougatsa is a Greek custard embedded between crispy buttery layers of filo dough, and then sprinkled with powdered sugar and cinnamon.
Usually I made an omelette using the zucchini and bell pepper, and Cookie had bought some Greek Kaseri cheese, and the neighbor across the road has chickens and gave her fresh eggs.
As we chopped up the vegetables, we saved the parts we don't eat for the chickens, because as Cookie said, "We feed the chickens and the chickens feed us." But she said the neighbor said to never feed the chickens fish because it makes the eggs taste fishy!
I wish someone had taken a picture of the omelette one day. They were beautiful and delicious!
We saved the leftover bread for lunch and used it to soak up the olive oil, vinegar and vegetable juice. Scrumptious!
We also enjoyed a few other different salads, like some with figs and balsamic. And dolmades (stuffed grape leaves,) too, of course.
It would have all been quite healthy if not for our insatiable sweet tooth! Almost every day in Patmos we visited the bakery in Skala and got freshly baked pastries and gelato--bueno, tiramisu, cookies, and Ferrero Roche flavored. Sometimes twice a day. We usually had something sweet after every meal, not to mention other snacking.
As Wally and I anticipated our trip to Greece, one of the things I most looked forward to was the food. Remembering how in 1985, I put on 15 pounds in 6 weeks, and knowing that it's even harder to get weight off now that I'm pushing 60, I began WW in February, and lost 15 pounds in preparation for our trip. This time, I gained 10 pounds in 15 days! So, time to get back to WW to prepare for the holidays!
Cookie insisted on washing dishes because she said she enjoyed it. Also, she has learned how to conserve hot water, which is quite limited. Check out the hot water heater, which is kept just below the sink! Gets hot fast! But it doesn't last long!!
We also enjoyed Greek pizza, grilled calamari and octopus.
After leaving Patmos, we enjoyed more good food in Athens, both at our hotel and other restaurants. By the way, if you ask me, one of the best kept secrets in Athens is the Acropolis View Hotel. It's a nice, but basic "no frills" hotel with an amazing rooftop view where they serve free breakfast every morning.
