Ancient Greek Meal

Hi everybody, my name is Hannah and this is Pepper and Pine, and I have an ancient Greek meal to share with you today. We are getting a lot of inspiration from this book called Food and Cooking in Ancient Greece by Clive Gifford, and today we're going to attempt to make all the recipes in this book. We're going to start with these barley cakes, and while we couldn't find barley flour at our local grocery store, I did find a couple of alternatives. So today we're going to use a cup of multi-grain flour, which includes some barley flour, a cup of white flour, and you could use whole wheat, and a cup of jovial gluten-free flour, which includes some rice flour. To this we're going to add about a quarter to a half teaspoon of salt, and about a half packet of yeast. And then I'm going to add some honey to this, about three tablespoons, and about three tablespoons of butter. And to this I'm going to add two tablespoons of cream, and then I'm going to add water until we make it up to about one and a half cups of water, so that our dry ingredients to wet ingredients are about two to one. Next you want to mix this up well, you do not need to knead it. Then you can just cover it, set it aside, and let it rise for about two to four hours. Next we're going to work on our lentil soup, and again we are getting inspiration from this book, which includes a lot of culture and history related to ancient Greece, as well as all of these recipes. Now this recipe calls for one cup of brown or green lentils. I'm going to set them on this tray and sort through them to make sure there aren't any stones in them. And then I'm going to put it in a pot of water to boil for about ten minutes. So there's probably about two or three cups of water, and after ten minutes you want to drain this, but we're going to be cooking them again. So I'm going to put them back into the pot, and I'm going to add the water as well as the other ingredients. So there are two more cups of water in there, and while that begins to boil I'm going to prepare the other ingredients that are going to go into the lentil soup. So I am cutting up some carrots as well as some onions, and then a couple of cloves of garlic. I'm just going to smash them up, and then use my little press to smash the garlic. I'm adding two to three bay leaves, and now I am adding all of those ingredients to the boiling lentils, and then to that I am adding a whole can of tomato chunks. And I'm drizzling a little bit of olive oil, some black pepper, and some salt. Next we're going to work on the spanakopita. Now this recipe was not in the book, and it is probably not an ancient Greek recipe, but we decided to add it anyway. This recipe calls for thawed and drained spinach, one onion that's been diced, four eggs, a teaspoon of dill, three to four cloves of garlic. I am using my garlic masher for this. And then to this we're going to add ten ounces of feta. It crumbles really easily, and then we want to give it all a good mix. To this we are going to add some black pepper, and then you can add a little bit of salt, but not too much because the feta cheese is already a little bit salty. Now it's time to prepare our tray, and I am laying down two sheets of phyllo dough. I'm adding a little bit of olive oil, and then another two layers of phyllo dough. So I'm going to do this three or four times, and then I'm going to put all of the filling onto that phyllo dough, and then I'm going to cover it again with about a total of four to six sheets of phyllo dough. That last one got a little bit torn, but that's okay. Tastes just as good in the end. Just want to cut it a little bit and drizzle a little bit of olive oil on top. Then we can pop it in the oven for 55 minutes at 325 degrees. Next we're going to work on the souvlaki, the chicken recipe, and for this you want to make sure that you allow yourself enough time to marinate the chicken, so you need about two to three hours to marinate it. And for this recipe we are going to use some onions and garlic, and I decided to try using my garlic press with the onions just because I ran out of time to marinate it, and I thought that that might help marinate it faster. And then we're going to add our seasonings, and you can find more information about these recipes down in the description box below. And then we're going to add some white grape juice to this. So I have my chicken that's already been cleaned and diced up, and now I just put it in there for about 20 minutes, even though the recipe called for about two to three hours of marination. I'm using some bamboo skewers to put my pieces of chicken on, and you just want to give them enough space so they're not too crowded. And then on my indoor grill, I am going to grill them for about three to four minutes on each side. You just want to make sure they're completely done all the way through. The next recipe we're going to work on is baked fish with feta, and I am using some Dover sole for this recipe. The first thing I'm going to do is cut up the chives and add the other herbs for this recipe. My fish has already been defrosted, and I've already washed it and set it aside to dry. So I am just getting the topping ready. So I added some feta and some pepper, and now I'm going to prepare my pan. I just add a little bit of olive oil, going to set up all of these filet of fish, and then I am going to top it with the topping that we just made. So now we just want to bake it at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes. So now my dough has risen, and it is time to make our little barley cakes. So I'm going to roll this out on my floured countertop, and next I'm using some cookie cutters just to make these little round barley cakes. I'm going to put them on some parchment paper on my tray, and then we're going to bake it in the oven, and I have to tell you, these turned out really, really tasty. They were quite the winner. Next we're going to work on our yogurt dip for those barley cakes. And I have some fresh thyme, about a teaspoon, and then about two to three cloves of fresh garlic. Again, I'm going to just use my garlic press for that. We're going to add three ounces of feta, a drizzle of olive oil, and about a third cup of Greek yogurt. We're going to mix that all together and just kind of let it marinate for a little bit. It's really good. The garlic gives it a nice, good punch. So I'm also going to have some cucumber slices, grapes, and some olives to finish off this meal. Let me just tell you, it was quite the winner. There are a number of recipes that we intend to do in the future. The fish was an okay success. That sauce was a great success. It tasted really good on the lentil soup as well. The grapes were done for dessert by the end of the meal. Those barley cakes were such a winner that we made them again the next day. The chicken probably would have tasted better if we gave it more time to marinate. And the spanakopita, of course, is always a winner. This is a closer look at all of the dishes that we had for this ancient Greek meal. Of course, the spanakopita is a modern addition, but it is a tasty one at that. If you want to see some of the other projects and tutorials that we are doing with our ancient Greek unit study, you can tap on the screen right now. If you want to see what we are up to on a daily basis, don't forget that you can find me on Instagram at Pepper and Pine.