Monday 12 December 2016

Patates yiahni

Potatoes stewed with tomatoes, carrot and celery.

A simple peasant dish served hot on a cold winter's day, cold on a summer evening.   This is perfect for Lent, meatless Wednesdays and Fridays and the 15 fasting days before Christmas (for some).   This is the sort of dish you would be served up if you ate at a monastery, or at our house between feasting.



- Chop one onion
- peel a carrot and cut into thin slices
- thinly slice a few sticks of celery, stalks and leaves
- slice 2 cloves of garlic 
-  3 or 4 potatoes peeled and cut into large chunks

Put them all in a pot with a few tablespoons of oil and brown slowly till the onion has softened a little

- Add a wine glass of white wine
- put 2 or 3 tomatoes through a little mixer and add them to the pot
- add a bay leaf 
- one teaspoon of sugar
- salt and pepper
- a little cumin for the adventurous

Boil slowly for 30-40 minutes till the potatoes have cooked and the sauce has thickened a little.  Add some water if the tomatoes were not very juicy.

Strips of green pepper, some crumbled feta cheese, a small hot pepper or some chilli would make it something special




A bottle of local olive oil on the left, Vaso's white wine on the right





In the pot ready to boil


On the plate

Serve with feta cheese, a dish of olives, lots of village bread and a few glasses of wine





13 comments:

  1. Mmmmm looks good! Mind you, anything with feta cheese, bread, and wine would be good. -Jenn

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  2. It's a very simple recipe , a main course here but I guess it would be more of a side dish in other countries

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  3. I shall try that soon here.

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  4. That sounds absolutely perfect for cooking on top of my wood-burner; and the smell would be wonderful.

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    1. Would cook nicely there and smell even better. needs a little chilli/pepper to give it a bit of a zip and a glass of wine of any colour to enjoy it with

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  5. My mouth is drooling.
    What kind of white wine? Would it matter if it was sweet or dry?
    Becuser you know. My family comes from Samos we love our sweet wine lol
    I ordered that mountain tea. I'm going to give it to my dad in his Christmas parcel. I hope he likes it

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    1. Samos....ahhhh yes indeed, great wine. Years ago a friend and I would buy a bottle or two of sweet Samos wine to drink at Xmas. She's gone now but you have reminded me to buy some. I'll keep it for the dessert...the downunder... pav ! Bet your father loves the tea. So very greek. Kala christoyenna

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  7. We are going to make it for our tea tonight. Will report back later. Looks great.

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    1. Good luck and Kali orexi (good appetite). It's very plain. I hope you enjoy it. Add lots of chilli to give it a kick!

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  8. It was very enjoyable LA. We had ours with corned beef. It reminded me of home made soup that my mother use to make with lumpy vegetables on a cold winters day. Keep posting the Greek recipes for us to try - please!

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    1. So glad you tried them. I've got another winter recipe coming up soon. This one has meat in it. Lots of greek recipes dont have meat. They just eat lots of feta and olives and salted sardines with the meatless. Anyway, bravo!!! I'll swap you Irish for greek

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