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Santorini
Gastronomy
. Santorini food and wine
Santorini's cuisine is primarily based on
the island's own agricultural products.
Products nourished by the volcanic soil, the
sea breeze and the sunshine of the Aegean
Sea, giving them a unique taste. When
combined with the almost exclusively organic
cultivation of the island the result is top
quality ingredients that produce original,
tasty and healthy food.
Traditional dishes such as tomato balls,
Santorini salad, split peas in all their
variations, white aubergines, stuffed round
courgettes, omelette, cooked capers, fresh
cheese, and local specialities including
apohti (a type of cured ham), sausages, wild
rabbit with a cheese and egg sauce, brantada,
sweet melitinia, and saffron bread rusks,
all portray the tasty culture of the island.
If you add the great variety of wines
produced on the island, from the dry whites
to the sweet Vinsanto and the wonderful
taste combinations that they create, then
you will understand why the many
restaurateurs, the gastronomy experts, Greek
and foreign journalists have embraced and
promoted the tastes of Santorini.
Santorini, a small island that has already
made a name for itself in the world of taste
and is considered by most, a gastronomy
destination which offers some of the
country's best restaurants, wineries and
taverns.
Santorini is frequently acclaimed in
international publications referred to
gastronomy during the last years for both
its unique natural products as well as its
superior cuisine. This line of development
is usually discouraged by the excessive
tourist exploitation but we have here an
exception to the rule and the answer lies in
the islands past.
Historically, Santorini's exceptional
volcanic soil and its microclimate have
proved to be ideal for the growing of
outstanding products of unique taste, highly
praised not only in Greece but also
internationally, including: the wine, the
small tomatoes and their paste, the split
peas, and the white aubergine.
When most of the local people turned their
backs on agriculture and went after their
chance in the tourism industry, these unique
products began to face the possibility of
extinction.
However, the decline was luckily reversed,
around the late 1980's, when some of the
wine producers and restaurant owners linked
the local products and cuisine and attempted
to integrate them within the fast growing
tourism industry of the island. This was
achieved by keeping the tradition of the
island and by adapting and promoting the
products to suit modern gastronomic demands.
The media, concerned in gastronomy and
tourism, both in Greece and internationally,
supported this effort with enthusiasm. The
endeavor had its followers which increased
the demand for the unique local products
thus encouraging the interest of the local
producers and, naturally, the competition
for higher quality amongst them. Under this
agenda Santorini started to develop as a
gastronomic destination.
The wineries opened their doors to the
visitors for tasting and multimedia
presentations, the restaurants begun cooking
courses and various gastronomical groups and
associations started visiting the island.
International sommelier meetings took place,
and slow food participations, thematic
conferences focused on local products were
organized (maybe the only ones in Greece).
Many plans are currently underway for the
promotion of the island as a fist class
gastronomic destination.
If one adds to all these "taste experiences"
the most "tasty" of all, which is the island
of Santorini itself and its extraordinary
landscape then I think we can claim that
Santorini is a remarkably "tasty"
destination.
Stuffed Santorini cherry tomatoes
Ingredients:
1 kg Santorini cherry tomatoes
2 large finely chopped dry onions
1 bunch fresh basil
250 gr rice
Salt, pepper, olive oil, pinch of sugar
Preparation:
Open up the cherry tomatoes and remove the
contents. Put a little olive oil into a
frying pan and roast the onions. Once they
have browned, add the basil and the contents
of the tomatoes. Once it comes to the boil
point leave it for 10 minutes and then add
the rice, salt and pepper. After 5 minutes
turn off the heat and stuff the cherry
tomatoes.
Cook at 220 C for approximately 200 minutes.
Octopus with Vinsanto and saffron
Ingredients:
1 medium-sized octopus (1 1/2 kg)
2 bay leaves
2 cloves of all spice
1 sachet of Greek saffron (from Kozani)
150 ml Vinsanto
150 ml olive oil
Preparation:
After washing the octopus carefully, put it
in the cook pot with the bay leaves, the all
spice and the saffron. Cover and let it
simmer in its own juices for about 1 1/2
hour. Add the wine and boil until the sauce
thickens. Remove from the fire and stir in
the olive oil. Serve with rice as a main
dish or without as a starter.
Restaurants in Santorini
Restaurants are not a place to have a taste
to eat before an evening of entertainment,
they are the entertainment. And whether you
go to a local tavern or to a chic restaurant
you will see that the Greeks take their time
over food. Taverns are usually more
inexpensive than restaurants - they feature
simple but tasty dishes...
Santorini Wine
After the devastating volcanic explosion,
about 1650 BC, the island was covered with
volcanic ash, lava and magma stone. This
catastrophe created the foundation for
perfect soil conditions which now help
produce the very distinctive wines of
Santorini. For this reason, one of the
qualities of cuisine of Santorini is the
wine..
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