It’s already a week since last week’s Greek Easter Sunday and  would do it all over again just to delight into this centerpiece dish of roasted leg of lamb. Greeks enjoy their meats more on the cooked side. It doesn’t necessarily mean charred to a crisp but it certainly is nowhere near anything resembling pink. [...]

Another usual suspect that’s present at the Greek Easter table is Kokoretsi. It’s a rotisserie dish made up of skewering seasoned lamb or goat organ meat, wrapped in caul fat and then by yards of cleaned intestines. There are tavernas in Greece that specialize in grilled meats, rotisserie and serve up Kokoretsi all year ’round [...]

Here we are, the day after Easter Sunday and another feast under our belts…literally! Easter for Greeks is the most significant religious holiday. With Easter, you get the death and resurrection of Christ…we don’t take death and rebirth lightly. Easter’ parallel with Spring, a new cycle of birth and regeneration all fall together perfectly for [...]

Easter is upon us once again. Today is Megalo Savato, on the eve of Easter and in practically every Greek home, family members are astir with preparations for tomorrow’s feast: an array of appetizers including grilled meats, salads, dips, breads, lamb as the centerpiece of the meal, roasted potatoes. vegetables and a fruit platter and [...]

This past Easter, our family came to a consensus that we would not roast a whole lamb on the spit. Greek Easter fell earlier on the calendar (April 19th) and the weather was indeed cooler than seasonal norms. We opted for a whole leg of lamb on the spit and decided to offer “lamb two [...]

The sweetbreads I’m discussing and cooking with today are considered offal. To look at sweetbreads, one would make the common mistake of thinking they are brains (in fact they are not). Sweetbreads come from the thymus glands, located at the chest entry, just before the trachea. They are only found in young animals as they [...]

I’ve thought carefully on whether to post the recipes from this past Easter in clusters or individually. I’ve chosen the latter for the simple reason of keeping the clarity of recipes in the archives of the blog and to make them easier to search for. You might get a flurry of posts from me in [...]

Hristos Anesti (Christ Has Risen)! I would like to wish all of my Greek family, friends, philHellenes who celebrated Easter yesterday. I hope your day was filled with many fond memories, that the Gods blessed you with some good Spring weather and the banquet of Easter delights exceeded all your expectations. Despite the gloomy forecast [...]

I’m often asked why us Greeks celebrate Easter on a different day than everyone else. This question is only partly true as I can recall when our Easter fell on the same day as the Catholic Easter. A calculation is made and there are three main factors that affect the date: It is based on [...]

Seeing as how it is Holy Week for the Greek-Orthodox, most of us are fasting in some degree and we’re also juggling the duties of preparing for the big feast that awaits us this upcoming Sunday for Easter. Toronto boasts of having about 120,000 Greeks in the Toronto area, over a dozen churches and our [...]