Regardless of whether you are Greek or not, live in Greece or among the Diaspora or if you are real lucky and you get to spend the holidays in Greece – I think a primer on the Greek Christmas is the call of the day.
When Greeks speak of the holidays, we mean Christmas, New Year’s [...]
Chef Michael Psilakis and I continue our one hour-plus conversation here. We delve into the subjects of ingredients, his recent visit to Greece, growing up Greek in the US, kitchen tools, Michael’s cooking influences, cooking for his family and Michael shares with us some of his favourite memories, triggered by food.
If you are not reading [...]
In less than two weeks, I’ll be back in Greece again for my vacation. This will be my 20th time and I still get excited about going.
I still have some experiences to share from last year’s trip. One of the most cherished memories has to be when I attended a traditional Greek wedding on the [...]
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 for a [...]
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 the [...]
My parents come from towns in northern Greece (Macedonia) that are located in the mountains but most of my time spent in Greece is near the sea. All of my relatives in Greece are on my mom’s side of the family and the majority of them live in Greece’s second largest city, Thessaloniki.
One of Thessaloniki’s [...]
Today is the last day of Carnival in the Greek calendar. Tomorrow will be “Clean Monday” and the start of the Great Lent. Clean Monday acquired it’s name from long ago: it was the day on which the housewives cleaned all their kitchen untensils so as to rid the last traces of the Carnival food.
Clean [...]
Today in Greece, it’s one of the biggest celebrations of food, it’s “Tsiknopempti” or literally, “burnt Thursday”.
In Greece, they are well into Carnival celebrations. The most well known city for Carnival celebrations takes place in Patra but there are other cities & towns with their own unique, most interesting and often hilarious ways of celebrating [...]
when all through the house,
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
We’re upon that magical day, Christmas. I feel it today…that state of mind, the Zone. It’s not just a holiday, it’s a state of being…almost out of body – surreal.
Christmas, the holidays, the end of the Year all wrapped-up in one month. A [...]
Today is the Patron Saints’ Day for Constantine & Helen in the Greek-Orthodox calendar. For those of you who are Greek or those who are friends of Greeks, you’ll know that we have alot of Constantines and Helens out there.
My brother plus three first cousins share being named after my maternal grandfather, Konstantinos. My mom’s [...]
