Hellas, A Bit of Greek

So this recipe isn't strictly Greek. In fact, calling it Greek could quite possibly start a riot. But it does have feta, so I'd definitely call it Greek-ish. So what are we eating? Well thank you for asking. We're going to be tucking into some pork medallions, baked potatoes with feta, some greens (because they're good for you) and some homemade hummus and pita for dipping. I know what you're thinking. Well, I don't know for sure but I'm going to tell you what you should be thinking. Isn't lamb far more Greeky meatwise? Yes, yes it is. So by all means, use lamb chops if you prefer but I'll thank you not to interrupt me again. Now, on with it.

Baked Potatoes

I'm not going to spend too much time on this since it's essentially a baked potato that you add feta to. Rub, scrub and hug your potatoes. Hug them good right before you prick them with a fork repeatedly, you bastard. Then quickly suffocate them with tin foil and bang them in the oven for 40 minutes at 200 C. You're a monster.

Remove the baked potatoes from the oven and unwrap. To check if they're cooked through, pierce with a knife. Why stop the cruelty now, right? If they're nice and soft, cut a little cross into the top and crumble some feta into the gap. Add some pepper, thyme and oregano (I usually leave out salt as a seasoning when I'm using feta because it's salty enough). Sprinkle a dash of olive oil over the top and then return to the oven for ten more minutes.

Pork Medallions

Like I said, if you'd  rather use lamb chops for this be my guest, it'll work just the same. I love a nice piece of tender pork steak though, so it often invades cuisines it doesn't really belong to. Here's what you need:

• Pork steak
• A bunch of fresh thyme
• Bunch of rosemary
• 5 tbsp of balsamic vinegar
• 4 tbsp of honey
• Salt and Pepper

Start by cutting your pork into 2-inch thick medallions. Lay the cuts flat on your chopping board and sprinkle with your herbs and seasoning, coating both sides. Pour a little olive oil in a pan to get things going. Give each medallion  one good bash with your fist before adding to the pan. You don't really need to tenderise pork steak - it's already pretty damn tender - but that punch does flatten it out a bit to help it cook faster. There's nothing worse than having to cook your way through a 2-inch medallion and hoping that by the time the inside is ready the outside hasn't turned to jerky.  Flip the medallions every few minutes for a total cooking time of 8 minutes. Now add the balsamic and honey and stir into the meat. After another 2 minutes or so the balsamic should have reduced and left you with a nice glaze on the pork. Take off the heat and let rest.

Hummus

Again, I know hummus isn't Greek but the way I see it, in that part of the world everyone was invading everyone for centuries so I can be pretty sure that at some stage a Greek person ate some hummus. And that's close enough for me. I love me some hummus but I'm not crazy about a lot of the store bought varieties. They're usually either way too garlicky or have a chunky texture I'm not too fond of. I like my hummus like I like my women - fine and smooth. Then again, I do like my women garlicky, so maybe it's not a perfect analogy. Here's what you need:

• 1/3 cup pine nuts
• 1/2 cup of fresh basil
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 2 cans of chickpeas (2x 400g)
• 1/4 olive oil
• 1/3 lemon juice
• 1 tsp tomato puree
• Salt to taste (approx. 2 tsp)
• A few dashes of tabasco to taste

This shit is easy. Put it all in a blender and bam. If you want a slightly more pronounced pine nut flavour (I personally love pine nuts) you can toast them in a pan before you add them to the food processor. It only takes about 1 minute more and it adds an extra little kick. Now as I said above, I like my hummus nice and smooth so I add water, splash by splash till I get the consistency I like. If you like it chunky, don't bother adding water.

For this meal I almost use the hummus as a sauce for the meat and potatoes. It's a nice texture mix. Just in case you've got a bit of mopping up to do afterwards, heat up some pita breads to serve on the side. And of course, you'll now have plenty of hummus left over to enjoy for the rest of the week.

Veggies

There's a lot of different greens you can serve with this dish. I steamed some sweetheart cabbage and tender stem broccoli but you could just as easily char some asparagus (steamed asparagus = yuk, charred asparagus = yum) or do a quick Greek salad with cucumber, peppers, onions and olives. Whatever you decide on, just finish it off by crumbling some more feta over it and splashing on some olive oil and season.

TIps:

• If you're dining with a Greek person, don't tell them it's a Greek dish or they'll Molotov your house.
• If you're dining with a Greek and you've correctly not disclosed thet you consider this a Greek dish, don't then bring up the recession or they'll Molotov your house.
• If you can't think of a third funny tip, find something funny you wrote earlier on, delete it, and add it into the tip section instead.