Greece

Greece stretches from the Balkan mainland to thousands of islands in the Aegean and Ionian seas, and the olive tree grows almost everywhere in between.

Greece, a cuisine built on olive oil

• Olive oil: the first ingredient of most dishes.
• Filo pies: spinach, cheese or leeks wrapped in thin pastry.
• Cheese: feta above all, crumbled over salads.

Feta, a name with rules

Feta is a protected designation of origin, registered on the basis of a Greek ministerial decision of January 1994. Its specification calls it the most popular of the Greek cheeses, made in Greece “since the time of Homer”.

• Milk: sheep’s milk alone, or mixed with goat’s milk up to 30% of the milk’s weight.
• Area: Macedonia, Thrace, Thessaly, Central Mainland Greece, the Peloponnese and the prefecture of Lesbos.
• Ripening: in wooden or metal vessels of 7% brine, 15 days at 18 °C, then in rooms at 2 to 4 °C, for two months at least in all.
• Label: “FETA cheese PDO”.

Three grapes and their home ground

The earliest evidence of wine in Greece is dated to about 6,500 years ago, and Greek wine already held high prestige in Italy under the Roman Empire.

• Assyrtiko: a white grape native to Santorini, whose old vines have resisted phylloxera. It keeps its acidity as it ripens.
• Agiorgitiko: “St George’s grape”, native to Nemea and grown mainly in the Peloponnese.
• Xinomavro: “sour black”, the main red of Macedonia, centred on the town of Naousa.

Athens first

• The capital: the six food tours compared in this guide walk its old centre.
• The islands: reached by ferry from Piraeus, the port of Athens, or by domestic flights.

“Eating together is the foundation of the cultural identity and continuity of communities throughout the Mediterranean basin”, says UNESCO, which inscribed the Mediterranean diet of Greece and six other countries on its intangible heritage list in 2013.