Greek To Me

I recently experimented with making some dishes inspired by the Greek food to be had in Oakleigh. However I never closely follow recipes so this meal is a Greekish thing of my own. I imagined this food selection arrayed as share plates but I'm only me so made and ate them over three separate sessions. In each I made use of a flavour base comprising olive oil, minced garlic, lemon juice and finely chopped herbs (such as oregano). Here they are.

Fava Bean Dip with Crudites

I took one tin of cannellini or fava beans and crushed them with a fork. In a saucepan I mixed them on a low heat with my flavour base till I had a thick paste. In had separated the tinned water but next time will throw it back into the blend to result in a softer paste for better dipping action. For crudités I cut sticks of carrot, yellow capsicum and celery. This is the only dish I have shared with friends - taking it along to a video afternoon - and it met with approval.

Grilled Pork & Lemon Potato

I cut two pork cutlets into chunks and grilled them in the pan. Once served I crumbled some feta cheese over them. But two potatoes took more time and effort. They were boiled and then cut into large chunks or wedges to be stir-fried with my flavour base. It is for these that lemon juice was in my ingredient list but then for convenience also went into the other dishes. Lemon juice can be overpowering so I would at most use three half lemons for this entire meal (the last half lemon can simply decorate or be thrown into a water jug).

Mushrooms with Toasted Pita

I sliced a punnet of button mushrooms and threw them into the pan for cooking with the same flavour base. I also took two wholemeal pita breads cut into sixths (triangular sectors of a circular pita). These were toasted in the griller but I overdid it - they are thin and take barely any time to get a nice toasted texture. I ate them together with mushroom slices scooped onto the pita.

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There were other ingredients I considered but neglected to use. One was having baby spinach leaves as a bed on which to serve the crudités. Another was sprinking some sesame seeds over the pita bread. Maybe I need to present these dishes at another video afternoon dedicated to movies like Clash Of The Titans and Jason And The Argonauts.