The Greeks are on our minds this week.
I have a vague memory of lunch in a taverna with a view of Cap Sounion in Greece–must have been in 1966. I was 24.
I had gone there with a friend, after a punishing 18-month-stint at the old Playhouse in Salisbury. (We squeezed into a Fiat 600 and drove all the way.)
We ordered lamb chops and salad and started on the retsina.
Out came a large serving plate completely covered in lamb chops–grilled with olive oil and rosemary with feta cheese sprinkled over.
The generosity of the serving was memorable.
This was followed by another large plate of tomato and onion salad.
Lunch–simple!
for 2
4 lamb chops
sprigs of rosemary
2 garlic cloves–crushed and peeled
juice of a lemon
olive oil
for the salad
4 tomatoes–ripe as can be–sliced
1 large spring onion–sliced
olive oil
2oz feta cheese–broken up
Bathe the chops in two tablespoons of olive oil and the lemon juice; add the garlic and the rosemary.
Turn it all over and marinade for a couple of hours.
Heat a grill pad to hot.
Remove the chops from the marinade and season well with salt and pepper.
Place them on the grill pad and turn the heat down a little.
Cook them for 3 minutes.
Turn them over and repeat.
You can cut into one of the chops to check “doneness”.
“Doneness” is down to personal choice–we like it pinkish.
Arrange the chops on a favorite platter and sprinkle with feta and olive oil.
Assemble the salad on a serving plate, season with salt and pepper and bathe in olive oil.
We ate our fill of lamb chops and tomato and onion salads that trip and drank a vat of retsina–at sixpence a litre.
(It is remarkable that I remember anything!)
This is making me feel like booking flights and heading off to support the Greeks, search out that taverna and have lunch…
…naughty Lord Byron scratched his name in the ancient stone of the temple of Poseidon.
If you look carefully to the right of Byron, you’ll spot an equally naughty namesake of mine.
Not guilty, M’lud–honest!
Robin Ellis 