Award-winning food writer Georgina Hayden has revealed three lesser-known Greek and Cypriot dishes perfect for summer, all made with simple ingredients. The 43-year-old cookbook author, who grew up above her grandparents' Greek-Cypriot taverna, describes the recipes as 'gorgeous' and easy to prepare.
One of her favourites is tava, a slow-cooked lamb dish with rice or potatoes, tomatoes, onions and cumin. 'You really don’t have to do anything – you don’t pre-fry anything, you don’t pre-cook anything. It’s all completely raw, you literally just mix it all in a big tray and you put it in the oven,' she explains. Hayden suggests putting it in the oven on a Sunday morning for an all-in-one meal.
Another dish is yiahni, a style of cooking where vegetables are slowly cooked in olive oil and tomatoes, sometimes with meat. 'It’s a wonderful way of celebrating vegetables,' says Hayden, noting that cooking them for up to an hour makes them 'sweet and tender and delicious.' She recalls eating it with fresh bread, olives and olive oil.
The third recipe is afelia, slow-cooked pork with red wine and crushed coriander seeds. 'You wouldn’t find it anywhere other than a Cypriot person’s house or a Cypriot restaurant,' says Hayden, describing it as 'super tender, melt-in-the-mouth, and really aromatic.'
Hayden, who worked on Jamie Oliver’s food team for over a decade, has released a new cookbook called MEDesque, celebrating Mediterranean flavours. She encourages home cooks to experiment, saying, 'I’m never a prescriptive cook. I think it’s all about having things in your arsenal.'
