Dinners in Pellion 2 (7th-21st/Sep)

I was looking forward eating out in Pellion too. First eating out was in Agria. We were really tired, it'd been looong day since we left Suffolk. We (Marcus did all driving as usual, bless him) drove from Thessaloniki to Agria, by the time we got there, it was dark. So we decided to rest there before carrying on to Pellion. We managed to find a room by the beach, checked in, then now, we needed food! We saw a taverna by the sea(all of them were along there), he was still serving food. We ordered Greek salad and chips! My first chips in Greece. I was looking forward to this. and tasted sooooo good. The best chips for long time. Even chips me and Emma had on the Suffolk coast tasted no where near as good as this chips. This point, I felt even more excited eating out in Pellion. 

We got to Pellion, we stayed in small village called "Damouhari". 1 shop, 5 tavernas, quite a few apartments. Very pretty and rustic, cute village. I saw people I saw last year. Due to the end of season, not many people were around and very peaceful. In the little shop, where I bought tin of stuffed vine leaves, had a fewer selection so as German guy's shop. they let them selling out. and close the shop, go to Volos for 6 month till another season started. Well, that was the German guy in the shop(he owned Victoria's guest house) was doing. Work hard during the season for 6month, and the rest of year (6 month), no work and chilling out. Sounds good to me. OK, I'll work towards that as well ☺.

Anyway, we went out to eat maria's sister's taverna(lady who had the little shop, she also had a block of apartments). A guy there (I would imagine he was family too) told us wonderful veggie dishes on the menu previous evening when we were looking around. We both excited. these were what we had there.

We had: Kritama, stuffed peppers, briam, chips, giant beans and bead came €28.50. Very reasonable price. Never had briam before. I'm now a big fan of briam. Greek food rocks! Simple home cooking is the best! Her stuffed peppers were yummy. I never thought stuffed peppers were exciting food, but here in Greece, they were.  In my head, stuffed peppers related to dated 70's cooking, very bland and boring, so when Marcus told me about stuffed peppers, I didn't get excited to start with. anyway, since that night, we had three more eating out(very unusual for us), stuffed peppers were included in our order if they had them.......

Funny and I loved about taverna was, they showed us menu but they didn't have them anyway. they usually told us or asked us to come and have a look in their kitchen what they had. Typical Greek style. One night we had dinner in Ag. loannis. We wet round lots of taverna see if they had some veggie dishes. No many. We ended up going into the taverna next to some dis-used(?) hotel. Here, he had plenty veggie dishes. We ordered: stuffed peppers, spinach salad, chips, giant beans, aubergine salad, bread, iman.... tasted so good. I was excited when I saw the man bringing all foods. There was an posh retired English couple sitting near by, sounded like they were regulars and knew all staffs there. She was smiling at me this point. Later, we bumped into the English guy when we were on our way to Plaka beach. He thanked me. They liked seeing me excited about food. Wow, felt good, just being me made people smile and happy! Awesome! He told us spinach pie in the taverna was good. but we didn't go back there, maybe next year.

Our last eating out was small village called "Mouresi". Our original plan was to eat out in sleepy village Kissos. We ate out there last year, Costas took us one of taverna(see "night out with costas"), we had loads of stuffed vine leaves there. We went round the most taverna there and they only had 1-2 veggie dishes and salad, so we decided to go back to Ag. loannis. Marcus did suggested me going to Moruresi, I thought nothing would be open.... Well, we took wrong turn, and ended up in Mouresi anyway. So, parked our car by the square, saw taverna there was open, so asked what she had. Cor, blimey, we didn't speak each other's languages, but we understood what she said anyway. She took us to her kitchen, showed us what she had...Cor, it was heaven. We decided to have a dinner here. Her food looked so good. And Her food was the best, then maria's sister. Chips in Agria was the best chips.  These were what we had in Mouresi square taverna. Bless her, she was really sweet.

 Basically, this is Greek salad without feta.  lots of oregano, extra virgin olive oil, what more did we want? 

 Then, yummy and interesting stuffed peppers. Later I realised some people made  their stuffed peppers with mince meat. Thank god, her one didn't have meat.

 Green beans in tomato sauce. She sliced both edges to take stringy bits, cut them open, and cooked.

one lunch we ate out by the Damouhari harbour. His green beans were little stringy.  Tasted yummy though. There we had bean soup. It was a bit like minestrone with rustic Greek style. Of course, we both loved it. He was bit more pricey than other people. But he had good view of the harbour from his taverna.

 Chips! ❀❀❀

 Iman. I'd like to cook this dish, I've been looking in Internet to give me an idea how to cook tasty way. Just looking at this photo makes my mouth watery...☺☺☺

Cor, blimey, granny gave us her home made plum in syrup and Greek yogurt with blackberry(?).  Here in Greece, no need to order dessert, most of taverna(not all of them) gave customer sweets in the end. Maria's sister: lemon syrup cake(soaked with lemon syrup, good cake, 10points!☺), This granny's dessert:simple, home made, good yogurt, 10points!☺☺), Ag loannis: chocolate whipped cream(nice, simple, sweet, 8points!☺)

Later, I saw the granny serving foods to her mates(4 of them) they looked happy. Only us and those grand dads were eating outside of this Mouresi taverna, peaceful, quiet and quite romantic. Cats and a dog were hanging around us for foods, grand dads were giving them bit of chickens and bread. It was lovely pleasant night out. Then 2 German couple and one oriental person turned up saying hello to those grand dads. They had a oriental person with them. We saw them previous day in Papa Nero beach. We both smiled at each other. I didn't see many oriental person in Pellion, so, I was happy to see her. Then 2 of grand dads at the same time pointed at me as if " oh, there's another one here". I smiled. It was funny. So, me and those German people had a quick chat. This oriental person was Korean, she said hello in Korean to me. I thought she was very clever lady, she knew a bit of Japanese, spoke German fluently, and  English. I wonder what other languages she spoke? Cool. Then they walked off. Defo would like to go back to the taverna next year. 

Oh, I feel really hungry now, I need to eat my breakfast....☺☺☺

Dinners in Pellion, Greece 7th-21st/Sep

Wow, another beautiful holiday in Greece. I love visiting Pellion/Pelion, beautiful mountain, crystal clear sea, kind people, and simple way of life. Very rustic! That's what I love everytime I visit European countries. Every where we went in Pellion, there were chestnuts trees, walnut trees, pomegranates, figs, apples, pears, and we found sharon fruits! Unfortunately, sharon fruits weren't ready for us to eat, maybe another a couple of weeks???? they were still really green and hard. We love them! When we went to South of  France last year, we had them nearly everyday! I saw some allotment in people's gardens. They were growing: squash, courgettes, tomatoes, peppers, and list goes on. They all looked happy. Growing with plenty of sun and rain in the area make fresh products taste soooooo yummy and full of flavour. Each salad ingredients we had tasted so different from we have here in England. Even Waitrose's salad ingredients taste nothing compare to Greek products. Wow, sunshine make that much difference. Interesting! Anyway, that's why everytime i made salad for our dinners, I didn't have to do anything. I just made vegan aioli(garlic, extra virgin olive oil, and lemon juice. blitz it with hand blender, here it is, vegan mayo!) or simple dressing with lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil. That was enough. This is what we normally had:

these are our typical dinner. Just simple salad, vine leaves from local shop(they were in tin, but didn't taste tin, also taste gooood!) We had big chunk of Greek feta fro 3 evening, why not? At the end of the day, we were in Greece, feta and yogurt we must taste. And It was fun and taste soooooo good. Anyway, after that, we didn't have anymore feta, Marcus's intolerance of dairy products came up. But it wasn't as bad as when he was in England. We enjoyed very much!

For our breakfast, we had protein smoothies with local fruits and protein powder called "raw power". Taste very nice, and I liked them. Thinking of getting it for myself for my breakfast. 

We decided to alternate smoothies and Greek yogurt, fruits and honey, but after 3days of having dairy product, we just kept going with our smoothies. Anyway, this is our tasty breakfast.

I'm a big fan of Greek yogurt. Some honey we had was very intense and nutty. I would imagine bees were bizzy collecting from chestnut/walnut tree flowers. First jar of honey we got from Agria (small sea side village with lovely taverna, we stayed for a night on 7th) was very light, lemony and flowery. I never tasted honey like that. It was magic. I still dream about it.

As our holiday went on, I gave my dinner slight variations. I soaked dried broad beans, peel, then cooked. Then mixed with tomato and lemon dressing I made. Basically bit like raw variation of "big beans in tomato sauce". Of course, time to time, we bought proper big beans in tin too. 

Every evening, I was looking forward to our dinner. I enjoyed making everything we had. I added raw aubergines into our salad. I cut/slice thinly, sprinkle with some salt, let water drain, wash, squeeze out more water. doesn't taste bitter. Actually, this aubergine is nice to eat with soy and lemon dressing. (In Japan, we eat aubergine like this)

I also soaked some chickpeas. Even chickpeas and tahini tasted different. Marcus made some hummus. It tasted really good, I loved it. Cooked chick peas, lots of lemon juice, 2-3 heaped tahini, s&p, extra virgin olive oil and lots of garlic. Very simple, and versatile food. Hummus is my favo dip. I make it often when I'm at home. We had his hummus for 2 dinners. Following evening, I made chickpea and tomato salad(with lots of garlic and lovely sweet red onion!). We defo didn't go hungry. Didn't wast nothing either. How could we waste our food, we love our food and we were on holiday! 

Oh, another naughty things we had was crisps! We found lays olive oil crisps, we had it for our snack, more or less every afternoon. When we were in Agria, we found Lays baked olive oil and oregano crisps. We didn't see it after that. I saw Lays olive oil crisps in Mallorca. Why can we have it here too? It only contained olive oil, salt and potato. No naughty things in them. And less calories (a bit) than other Lays crisps. Having say that, I think it would be very dangerous for me, I would be eating it all the time! So, maybe, better to leave them in Greece or Spain.... Well, now I got more reason to go back there.