Weekend Cooking: Greek-ish by Georgina Hayden

I love buying new cookbooks, and I love it even more when you find a cookbook that you just know you are going to come back to time and time again. Greek-ish by Georgina Hayden is one of those books. 

Georgina Hayden has Greek-Cypriot heritage and this is her fourth cookbook. In addition to being a cookbook author she is also a food stylist. First off, I love the cover designs of this book. It is so bright and colourful, and the inside covers are a vibrant blue too. Her aim, as you can probably tell from the titles, is to share recipes that honour her heritage, but also are accessible for weekday family meals.

The opening lines of the introduction probably gives a pretty good feel as to what to expect. 

This book? It's Greek. Ish. And if you are saying "ish" with a scrunched up nose, a squinted eye and a slight wobble of the head or tilt of the hand, then you are on the right track.

The book is broken up into sections which include:

A good start

Small dishes & snacks

Everyday heroes

Things on sticks

Feasts 

Salads, sides & vegetables

Sweet tooth

In addition to these normal kind of chapters that you would expect to see there are a couple of really fun additions and these are my favourites in the book. For example, there is a section called "Say cheese..." where there are five different recipes for using different types of cheese. This chapter even starts with dad mum joke! There is a chapter called SAS which stands for the Spanakopita Appreciation Society which features 3 different recipes that use the flavours of spanakopita but in less traditional ways. There is another section called "Double negative -a mess in two parts" which features Greek inspired Eton Mess recipes. Yum1

The cheesecake I made a couple of weeks ago features in a chapter called "Baklava, a love story and inspiration" which includes four different recipes that are all using the flavours of Baklava. The recipe for the cheesecake is actually called "Baklava cheesecake, I love you". Having made the cheesecake it is fair to say I love it too!

Whilst Hayden doesn't shy away from using authentic recipes, she usually offer other options to allow the dish to be accessible to all of us. I have used more feta recently than I have in the last six months combined! I would never have thought to incorporate feta into sweet recipes. It even features in the cheesecake.

Here are some of the recipes we have tried:

One Pot Pastitsio - see recipe below

Psari Plaki: Baked fish with tomatoes and olives (although we left out the olives)

One-pot Chicken Thighs and Rice

Triple Fennel Pork Belly (we used a pork roast instead. So good though)

Roasted Lemon, Oregano and Feta Potatoes

Feta, Cherry and White Chocolate Cookies- unusual flavour combo but really good!

Baklava Cheesecake, I Love You  - I love you too!

As for recipes I still want to try, well, there are really too many to list, both sweet and savoury.

I did think about sharing the cookie recipe or the cheesecake recipe, but in the end I decided to share the recipe for One Pot Pastitsio. This is a recipe that I would still like to make the more traditional version of at some point, but this is now a regular in our meal rotations. It gives another option instead of spaghetti bolognaise.

One Pot Pastitsio 

2 tbsp olive oil
500g/1lb 2oz beef mince
2 onions, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tsp dried oregano, plus a pinch
½ tsp ground cinnamon
2 tbsp tomato purée
250g/9oz traditional pastitsio pasta, bucatini or penne (gluten-free, if needed)
1 litre/1¾ pint beef stock
300ml/½pt crème fraîche
2 free-range egg yolks
100g/3½oz graviera, kefalotyri or pecorino, finely grated
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Set a wide, deep frying pan over a high heat and add the olive oil. Add the mince, breaking it up well with a wooden spoon. Season generously and fry for 5–8 minutes, until any liquid evaporates and the mince starts to crisp.

When the mince has started to brown, stir the onions and garlic in with the oregano and cinnamon. Reduce the heat a little and fry for 5 minutes, stirring everything together (add a touch extra olive oil if it looks dry).

Stir in the tomato purée, fry for 1–2 minutes, then add the pasta to the pan. If you’re using traditional pastitsio pasta or bucatini, you may need to snap some of the pieces in half to fit them all in. It will be snug in the pan, but try to fit them all in. Pour over the beef stock, season and bring to the boil. Cover the pan, reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes, stirring once or twice.

Meanwhile, mix together the crème fraîche and egg yolks in a bowl. Stir in half the cheese with a generous pinch of salt and pepper.

When your pasta is ready, turn your grill to high. Gently toss the pasta and sauce in the pan together. Spoon the crème fraîche mixture over the top and sprinkle with the remaining grated cheese, plus an additional pinch of dried oregano.

Place under the grill, not too close to the bars, and grill for 3–5 minutes, until golden and bubbling on top. Keep an eye on it, as how long it takes will depend on the strength of your grill. Remove and leave to stand for at least 5–10 minutes before serving.

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page