My earliest recollection of eating rabbit was back in 1974 when I visited Greece for the first time. There were rabbits in a barn and although back then I thought they were pets, I soon found out they’d  be used for sustenance. The most popular Greek dish with rabbit is Stifado…a stew of rabbit, wine, vinegar, spices and lots of onions. Tomatoes are the base of the sauce and this stew simmers until the sauce is rich and the rabbit meat just falls off the bone. Stifado is sublime when using a wild hare or jack rabbit (love to get some from any local hunters).

Today’s recipe goes in another direction, a light brown sauce that’s perfumed with thyme, bay leaves and slices of orange peel. There’s also onions, garlic, wine and stock  and some carrots for some sweetness balanced by savory mushrooms.. This dish is a wonderful winter meal: oranges in season, rabbit plentiful and delish!

Braised Rabbit With Mushrooms and Orange

(serves 4)

1 whole rabbit, butchered into piece

coarse sea salt and fresh ground pepper

all-purpose flour

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 large onion, diced

3-4 cloves of garlic, minced

the peel of 1/2 orange, thinly sliced

2 Tbsp. tomato paste

2-3 bay leaves

2 tsp. of fresh thyme leaves

2 cups of sliced mushrooms

1 large carrot, peeled and sliced into rounds

1/4 cup dry white wine

1 – 1 1/2 cups of vegetable or chicken stock

salt and pepper to taste

1. Rinse your rabbit and pat-dry. Season with salt and pepper and lightly dredge in flour. Place a large skillet on your stovetop and add the oil. Over medium-high heat, brown both sides of your rabbit pieces then reserve.
2. Now add the onions, garlic, carrots, bay leaves, thyme and stir. Add some salt and pepper and stir in then sweat for 5-6 minutes. Now add the tomato paste and stir-in and cook for a minute.
3. Now the rabbit pieces go back in the sklllet along with the wine and enough stock to come up halfway up the meat. Bring up to a boil then reduce to simmer and place the lid on (slightly ajar) and cook for about 45 minutes or until the rabbit is fork-tender. Remove the lid and simmer uncovered until the sauce has thickened and adjust seasoning one last time with salt and pepper.
4. Serve on a bed of hilopites (Greek egg noodles) and pair with Carras Limnio white from Halkidiki.

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© 2012, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

I made my Cranberry sauce with sugar, whole cloves and simmered them until the cranberries popped and the sugars and started to thicken with the pectin in the berries. I then spiked the cranberry sauce with a sweet fortified Greek  wine called Mavrodaphne and finished it with some orange zest and a good squeeze of orange juice. Crostini gets smeared with roasted garlic, baked Brie gets topped with warm cranberry sauce then Brie and cranberry sauce top the garlic and bread. Slip in the mouth and hum with delight then wash down with your favourite sparkling wine.

Baked Brie With Roasted Garlic & Cranberry-Mavrodaphne Sauce

Cranberry-Mavrodaphne Sauce

1- 340gr. package of fresh or frozen cranberries

1 cup of sugar

1 cup of water

3-whole cloves

1/4 cup Mavrodaphne wine (or other fortified red wine)

zest and juice of 1/2 orange

1 round of Brie cheese

some extra-virgin olive oil

splash of sparkling wine

1 head garlic

1. In a small pot, add your water, sugar, cloves and Mavrodaphne and bring up to a boil over medium heat. Now gently drop in the cranberries and return to a boil then simmer for 15 minutes stirring occasionally. Take off the heat and add the orange zest and juice and allow to cool.
2. Pre-heat your oven to 300F and slice a baguette into thin slices and brush both sides with olive oil and place on a baking tray. Now take a hold head of garlic and slice off enough of the top to just expose the garlic cloves and place in some foil, drizzle with olive oil and tightly close the foil around the garlic. Place the Crostinis and garlic in the oven and bake the bread until just toasted and the garlic for about 30 minutes.
3. In the meantime, unwrap your Brie and if it came in a wooden container you may bake it in that or use a Brie baking vessel with a lid. Drizzle the brie with olive oil and some sparkling wine and place the cover on and slip into your oven for 20 minutes.
4. Arrange your Crostini on a platter and carefully squeeze the roasted garlic beside the bread. Place the baked Brie on the platter and pour some cranberry sauce on the baked Brie.
5. Smear roasted garlic on the Crostini then place some hot Brie and cranberry sauce on top and enjoy! Serve with a Domaine Tselepos Amalia Brut Sparkling White.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

Rock samphire has large leaves and it grows out of rocks that are near the sea. It’s best to pick samphire in the Spring time but with a little blanching (mellow the favour) this delicious and healthy green is delish. This salad was made to accompany the grilled amberjack dish and I made a couple of weeks ago and I’d recommend serving it alongside any other grilled fish dish.

There’s sweet thick slices of onions that are cooked until just softened. Good wine vinegar is then added into the skillet and the onions get a quick pickle from this process and then olive oil, orange juice and segments are added into the salad (all while still warm). I used fennel fronds on this occasion as I do enjoy the flavour of anise but you could also use tarragon for a similar effect or dill would work wonderfully too!

Samphire Salad With Onions & Orange

(serves 4)

approx. 4 cups of samphire ( leaves and tender stems)

1 large medium onion, sliced

1 large clove of garlic, minced

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

2 Tbsp. red wine vinegar

1 orange, peeled and cut into segments/supremes

salt and pepper

1 Tbsp. chopped fresh fennel fronds or tarragon

1. Rinse your samphire well and strain. Place a large pot of water on your stove-top and bring to a boil. Add a good amount of salt and samphire and boil for about 6-7 minutes or until just fork tender. Strain the samphire and run cold water over it until it’s just warm.
2. In the meantime, add the olive oil into a pan over mdium heat along with the sliced onions and garlic. Add some sea salt and cook down the onions for about 5-6 minutes or until they are soft and translucent. Now add the wine vinegar and squeeze in the orange juice that’s left in the hull of your segmented orange. Simmer while stirring for a couple of minutes and take off the heat.
3. Add into a bowl the onions, samphire and toss gently. Adjust seasoning with salt, pepper, add orange segments, fennel fronds and serve warm or room temperature as a side with grilled fish.

NOTES: The scientific name for Samphire is Crithmum maritimum L. and it belongs to the Apiaceae (Umbelliferae) family. The seeds of the plant resemble barley and the ancient Greeks called samphire “krithamon”. Samphire can be found on rocky shores of European Atlantic and Mediterranean and reproduction of samphire is through cuttings. Samphire is best when harvesting it in mid-Spring, before it flowers but you may blanche or boil it if you find some later in the year. Always consult some locals before picking and sampling any greens you’re not sure of.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

I’m not sure where I’m going this year for side trips or new places I haven’t visited yet. Greece is having another difficult year and I’m not sure if my friends will be taking any vacations apart from their summer homes. I may visit an island or two…Aegean or Ionic or one of each? I may just stay local and tour parts of northern Greece that I’ve yet to visit. I may take another side trip to Constantinople (Istanbul)…a city that still mesmerizes me and one that I enjoy exploring.

A visit to Greece’s capital, Athens, is likely as there are lots of friends to visit and there’s always some fabulous eating to be done there. I’m not sure where this year’s Greek summer will take me but I will be eating and drinking and I’m taking this recipe for Greek Sangria with me. Sangria is a chilled concoction of wine, fruit, soda, sugar or a simple syrup with some fruit and booze to balance the sweeteners.

The syrup I use to make my Greek Summer Sangria is the focus of my recipe – the one that gives this one the edge over other recipes and the reason I was asked to make/bring this sangria over and over and over again to parties, barbecues and gatherings. You see, when you’re mixing a sangria, you’re looking to cut the tannins and make it into a summer, fruit-forward drink that’s light enough to drink all afternoon yet there’s enough booze in there to add to your summer “glow”.

My Greek Summer Sangria uses those bottles of wine that I received as gifts and yes, perhaps they aren’t my preferred choices but I also wouldn’t regift them. So, into the bucket went some screw-top red, one sliced peach and one sliced orange, a couple of cans of ginger ale, and syrup to sweeten the mixture. I was about to make a simple syrup by boiling water and sugar but I remembered that I had a jar of syrup leftover from when I made Baklava ice cream and I took a chance and poured the syrup into the sangria. AMAZING!

The sangria takes on some of the cinnamon and cloves that infused the syrup and the sangria has just enough sweetness to please the ladies yet there’s still enough booze (thanks to the Metaxa brandy) to make it popular with the dudes as well. I’ve laid out a recipe per one bottle of wine but I recommend making a batch with 3 bottles of wine and tripling the recipe. After last night’s barbecue, the next batch of sangria make have to be made with 6 bottles!

Greek Summer Sangria

For the syrup

2 cups of water

1 cup sugar

2-3 strips of lemon or orange peel

1 cinnamon stick

4-5 whole cloves

1/2 cup honey

Sangria Mix

1-750 ml bottle of red wine

1/2 cup Metaxa brandy

1 ripe peach, sliced

1 orange, sliced

2 cans of ginger ale (or 7-UP/Sprite)

1 cup of syrup

1. To make the syrup, first add the water, sugar, cinnamon, cloves and lemon peel in to a small pot and bring to a boil. Then lower to a simmer and boil for another 6 minutes. Take off the heat and add the honey and allow to cool. Remove rind, cinnamon and cloves.
2. Add your wine, sliced fruit, ginger ale and brandy and stir. Add the syrup in increments, stir and make as sweet as you wish. Cover and place in the fridge overnight.
3. To serve, place some ice in each glass and pour the sangria.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

The original recipe calls for using racks of lamb that would be covered in this exotic marinade for an hour room temperature at a minimum. A rack of lamb works if you’re entertaining a more formal gathering but this dish soars to greater heights when you cut the rack into chops and allow the marinade to cover all sides of the lamb. That’s more flavour!

There are 2, no 3 cuts that will give you delicious, tender lamb chops: the best are the rib chops, where one also gets the French rack of lamb. Then there’s the loin chops, which look like T-bone steaks, just smaller…lamb T-bones. Then the third class is the shoulder chop. With a good marinade overnight, this cut can/will be very tender. All three of these cuts will work with this marinade and most certainly made for grilling.

If it’s winter or you don’t have a grill, apply this marinade to a rack of lamb, liberally painting the marinade all over the rack. If it’s summer or if you’re as tough as a Canadian and grill in the winter in -20C conditions, opt for the grilled lamb chop route. This way, more surface area of the lamb is covered in this…..magical marinade that smells so good you want to eat the lamb chops raw!

To this date, I cannot find the recipe card but I’ve made this dish enough times to remember the ingredients and with some playing around with the measurements, I’ve got it down.

Before anyone accuses me of snapping up a recipe as my own…let it be said that I only recall that this recipe was in a booklet of dishes presented by the winery Jackson-Triggs. If anyone recognizes the recipe and remembers the chef who created this dish, please let me know so that I can give due credit.

There are many who are “iffy” on lamb. This is the dish that will convert the lamb-hater. Worried about lamb’s gamey flavour? Not here.

Looking for a lamb recipe that’s moist and succulent? This is the one.

Want to impress someone on a date or dinner guests with minimal effort? Try this recipe.

I’ve made this dish in record time with the meat covered in the marinade for an hour at room temperature and I’ve also patiently waited with an overnight marinate. The overnight marinate always wins.

Without further adieu, here’s the marinade for these succulent lamb chops…guaranteed to be fingah-lickin’ good!

Tangy Maple Mustard Lamb
(for 4)

2 racks of lamb loin or approx. 1 1/2 kg. of loin or shoulder chops
1/4 cup of olive oil
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh rosemary
2 cloves of minced garlic
1 tsp. black pepper
1 Tbsp. Dijon mustard
1/4 cup of Maple syrup
1 tsp. orange zest
1 tsp. sea salt

Pre-heated oven, set to broil

1. Rinse and pat-dry your lamb. If using racks of lamb, turn them to their underside and using a knife, scrape some of the silver skin to loosen enough of it to be held by your fingers. Tear if off the racks and discard it.
2. In a bowl, add all the ingredients together, mix with a spoon and reserve about 1/3 cup for coating the lamb when it’s cooked. Spread the marinade all over your racks of lamb or lamb chops. Marinate at room temperature for an hour or better yet (recommended), overnight in the fridge.
3. If cooking indoors, pre-heat your broiler and place your oven rack to the position closest to the broiler.  Season your lamb racks with some coarse salt and fresh ground pepper. Set your racks of lamb face up (bone side down) on the tray and place under the broiler for 5 minutes a side for medium-rare. Brush reserved warm marinade over the top of the racks of lamb.
4. If using gas or charcoal grill, pre-heat your grill to a high heat. Brush the grill surface with a grill brush and just before grilling, wipe the grill surface with a towel dampened with some vegetable. Grill for 3 minutes a side for medium rare, 4 minutes for medium. Allow your  lamb to rest for 5 minutes before serving. Present on a platter with sprigs of rosemary and wedges of lemon.
5. Serve with rice pilaf, grilled vegetables and pair with this Cypriot white from Paphos, a Kamanterena Xynisteri.

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.