Essentially Greek.....

 Greek cooking essentials.....

Essentials

The wooden pestle and mortar belonged to my mother in law 

I think the brass one came from her too

The brass one we still use to pound nuts or spices, nutmeg, cloves, mastiha, mahlepi

The large one is for pounding garlic and potatoes for skorthalia, or was, before the day of the food mixer. 

And

A large bottle of red wine. Agioritiko is  the most popular red grape variety in our area. It has notes of spicy plum, so they say. A good cheap red, I say. 

3 bottles of local olive oil which stay on our bench

One bottle is from last year's harvest, used in cooking

The glass bottle has the fresh oil for salads 

And a spray bottle 

Fresh fish from our Saronic Gulf

A typical size for fish around here

The fishmonger scales and guts them

K fries them

The cat gets the leftovers

The fish are called lithrinia in greek. Red or Grey sea bream says Google translate. 

As usual here they're fried whole. Good eating but so many bones and greasy fingers.  I'd love fillets but they don't often fillet fish here. They'd lose all their taste, they say, without the head and backbone

Lemons from our 2 trees

This photo was taken on a misty Winter's morning

A fresh baked loaf.  It rose slowly all night in the fridge. Bread making this way is convenient and always makes a excellent loaf. 

I mix the flour, water and yeast the night before. I don't Knead it much at all. The bowl is covered and left in the fridge. Early the next morning it has doubled in size. I take out the bowl, leave it an hour to warm up a bit. Punch it down and out it into the baking tin. Leave for half an hour to rise a little and bake. 

This one was for grandson Jamie who was going back to Athens after the Easter break to finish off the year's studies

Thyme and basil

And there's oregano, rosemary, parsley and sage in the garden too