The Tyropita

I have no idea how I can successfully catch a cold, which of course develops into a full-fledged flu, the worst possible time when I’m incredibly busy and can’t afford to be sick. Yes, folks, let the complaining begin.

I have the flu, or to be perfectly honest, I’m almost over it because if I were smack in the middle of suffering from it, I wouldn’t be able to write a single word, let alone a whole blog post.

I believe I’m very easy-going when I’m sick. I’m high-maintenance the rest of the time so I give people around me a break when I’m under the weather. Ha! Honestly though, I just sit quietly on the couch, watching my tv shows and films, falling asleep, making my own cup of tea and soup, unlike some other people (let’s not name names) that demand to be waited on hand and foot when they have a plain cold.

But let’s get to the tyropita (τυρόπιτα / pronounciation: tee-roh-pee-tah), the Greek cheese pie, which is the reason I got off my cozy couch. The word tyropita is not a simple word in the Greek language. There’s not a single Greek out there who doesn’t have a very specific image of tyropita in their mind the second they hear the word.

It’s one of the most well-known pies in Greek cuisine (next to spanakopita), a pie that everyone knows how to make and that everyone certainly knows how to devour in record time. And of course everyone has their favorite kind, because yes, there are different kinds of tyropita. Those can either depend on the type of dough used (phyllo, kourou, puff pastry), or the type of cheese(s) used, the most common of course being feta.

My ideal tyropita is one made with puff pastry. That’s the way my mom always made it, and still does. I have no idea why she prefers sfoliata (Greek word for puff pastry) to the traditional Greek phyllo, I’ve never asked her, as I’ve never had any complaints. I greedily ate my piece every single time she prepared tyropita.

Whenever I make my own puff pastry, I always bake a tray of tyropita. I use feta, ricotta (anthotyro when I’m in Greece) and a béchamel sauce all mixed together to create the filling. The result is a salty and slightly sweet cheese pie with that incomparable flavor and texture of puff pastry encasing the cheeses. A flaky, golden-brown and buttery puff pastry that makes my tyropita the best there is.

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French puff pastry - Pâte feuilletée

I was in the mood to make something with my hands. To create something out of nothing, not unlike a painter working on a blank canvas. I needed something to be proud of, something to show off and say “look, I made this myself, from scratch”.

Flour, water, butter. Lots of butter. Whole lots of butter. So much butter that no one person should consume on a regular basis. And yet, I needed even more. For to make puff pastry, you need to feel like butter is your friend and treat it as such. It will try to escape, to soften, to ooze out, but you need to contain it, know how and when to handle it.

Puff pastry is the queen of doughs. It’s not a difficult one to make, not when you can be patient, when you know some tricks and tips and when you understand the idiosyncrasies of her majesty, the pâte feuilletée.

This dough requires time—time to rest. It requires cold—cold hands, cold working area. It requires a good rolling pin and a little elbow grease. It will consume you for half a day, you need to pay attention to it, but while it is resting in the fridge, you’ll get a rest too and have the chance to tend to other things. And then, you can enjoy the glory of its hundreds of layers, the puff, the rise, the buttery goodness.

Puff pastry is not for the faint-hearted. If you love making doughs, then you’re going to love making this one too. If not, you can certainly find ready-made puff pastry that is good, when it’s made with actual butter that is. If you’re not one to shy away from a pastry challenge, this one’s for you.

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The Kourabiedes

Since we all managed to survive the Mayan apocalypse and we're still alive, let's enjoy our holidays now, okay?

For me, the holidays officially begin on the day I make the first Christmas cookies. These are of course the traditional Greek kourabiedes and melomakarona.

The moment they go in the oven and my apartment begins to fill with their sweet buttery and spicy aromas, my festive mood kicks in.

I can't believe that after three Christmases writing this blog, I haven't yet posted a traditional Greek Christmas sweet recipe. (Oops, I have!). The time has come though. The time for kourabiedes.

Kourabiedes/κουραμπιέδες (singular: kourabies/κουραμπιές) are shortbread-type cookies that are made with chopped toasted almonds and are covered with lots and lots of icing sugar. This time of year, they're made in every single household around Greece and are greedily eaten by everyone.

As is the case with all traditional Greek recipes, almost every family has their own version of kourabiedes, and in my family they're always made with sheep's milk butter or a combination of goat's and sheep's milk butter. Unfortunately, I can't find it in Holland so I swapped it for cow's milk butter, I made some adjustments to my original recipe since the two butters have different consistencies and my kourabiedes were delicious and buttery and everything a good kourabies should be.

Kourabiedes are generally shaped into crescents or balls, either large or bite-sized ones, and are dusted with copious amounts of icing sugar, which makes them look like little snowy mountains. There's nothing like these Greek cookies to make you feel like Christmas is here. Go on, make them!

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