Grilled Octopus Salad and Grilled Oregano Shrimp

On Saturday family and friends gathered in our yard, I prepped dishes in the kitchen and my husband lit the charcoals to help carry out my Grilling Greek event for May’s installment of Foodbuzz 24×24. This was only after my husband and I had been bickering for the greater part of Friday evening, he insisting it was going to rain the next day and we should postpone the barbecue and I insisting (yelling and demanding are good synonyms) that the barbecue needed to take place on the 29th along with the other 23 meals planned, hence the name Foodbuzz 24×24.

Foodbuzz 24×24: Grilling Greek

Memorial Day: the last Monday in May, a day of remembrance for those who died in our nation’s service, the official opening of our beaches and the unofficial start of summer. And nothing says summer like an All-American barbecue. So for this month’s Foodbuzz 24×24 event, we decided to “unofficially” usher in the new season by Grilling Greek to honor our Greek-American roots. Friends and family gathered in the yard yesterday where we enjoyed the warm weather by grilling some Greek-inspired dishes.

Garlicky Squid and Spinach Tsigareli — Σκορδάτα Kαλαμάρακια με Σπανάκι Τσιγαρέλι

Spinach: Not the most kid-friendly vegetable, you’ve got to admit. So when I put a heaping dish of this Garlicky Squid with Spinach Tsigareli in front of the kids the other day, it’s no wonder they kept pushing the green leafy strands to the edge of the dish and asking instead for more squid to compensate. Can’t blame them can you? Let’s just hope they’ll grow out of it one day; they’ll be missing out if they don’t. 

Magical Mastiha … Appetizers

The morning of the Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24 event, I opened up the shopping bag I’d brought back from my visit to MastihashopNY and surveyed my mastiha bounty. I’d indulged in purchasing a box of mastiha resin, a jar of pistachio spoon sweet and the cookbook Mastiha Cuisine written by Diane Kochilas (which I haven’t even gotten to open yet but will soon sit down and pour over). And then I quickly set out to begin prepping the day’s dishes …

Octopus Pot Pies

Welcome to the new Kali Orexi! I made some changes to my site and hope you find them agreeable. Any comments or suggestions that you think may provide some improvement are, of course, welcome. But I hope you enjoy it as is! I set out to make a few simple changes. “What could be so difficult?” I thought. Well, small changes or large, creating a new site is a feat indeed. I’m sure there will be some tweaking and some updating along the way, but for now here it is …

Ouzo Mezedes, Part II

Anise-flavored ouzo pairs well with seafood, so it was a given that octopus, shrimp, mussels and some small fish would have to make up the menu for our Foodbuzz 24, 24, 24: Greek Ouzo Tasting … in New York. There were also some chicken kabobs, sauteed potatoes, manitaropita (mushroom pie) and much more for guests to munch on as they sipped their ouzo. So here’s the last installment (finally!) of Ouzo Mezedes we served: Garides se Kantaifi me Pikantiki Magioneza–Shrimp Wrapped in Kataifi with Spicy Remoulade (Shrimp in Kataifi adapted from a recipe in