The Queen of Koym Kapi

How often does anyone say "It's the end of an era." when someone leaves the world? They have to be someone extraordinary. I have been lucky and have known three, women all- my grandmother, who died in 1991, her best friend who died just last year, lingering to hold a three day long cocktail party in her home for people to give their respects (it was packed. She wore lipstick, and held the lightest of drinks on her delicate, manicured hand. She was our last link to our favorite generation), and now a lady who left us just last night.

Eirini was the mother of my dearest friend, grandmother of my daughter's dearest friend. Loving and affectionate as she was in those roles, you somehow never thought of her in relation to anyone or anything else. Her existence was so grand, large, it could be contingent on nothing but her vibrance and verve. She had enough personality to be completely New York and completely Cretan at the same time- not expat, not immigrant, just utterly cosmopolitan. 

For those of you who haven't been, I'll introduce Koum Kapi, the easternmost of the three bays of Chania. It's a working class neighborhood, simple houses and shacks, narrow streets, a couple of 1970's apartment buildings, all around a fabulous beach- a ring of rocks we swim out to and kids dive from on the right, and the golden stones of the Venetian fortress on the left. The sun sets in between, a little more toward the fortress than the rocks. It is, like this lady, effortlessly beautiful, with integrity and innate, authentic style.

Every summer, a ritual drink on her balcony (so close to the sea it feels like you are on a boat, and nearly next door to our own apartment) marked the beginning of summer for me. Her living room, enormous and spare, had two day beds for lounging, some over-the-top mirrors, and an enormous chair she would have recovered from time to time to suit the mood. This was always changing - a different color of drape, an object or two, and she would effortlessly create a completely different environment; it was curated, there was an element of fantasy, more like a set for living. She had been a fashion illustrator in New York, making dreamy, evocative sketches we loved to look at. Copies of Vogue were stacked high in one corner- we would leaf through them while drinking Cretan wine poured from a plastic water bottle into short French tumblers- she knew quality, not pretension, and once you have tried the tawny rich wine of Crete that smells like an amontillado and is so strong you need an ice cube to dilute it, well, there is nothing like it. That living room functioned as a modern day salon- family and friends converging at their dynamic center, the heart of their world. It was also a haven, a place I was grateful to always find welcome. Style's not much without grace- she had lots and lots of both.

Her sense of high style was so timeless that it rendered her vaguely immortal, or, at the very least, ageless. We were out late one night and ran into her having drinks with some friends. We joined them. Pavlos later remarked "when you're out with her, you're just out with a woman." She was a year or two before 80 then, smoking, having a glass of wine, and talking with joy about culture, design. She was wearing one of her flowing caftans in a solid color- this one in vivid lilac, with excellent shoes and an even more excellent bag- bold and large. She had a collection of them. Of caftans too- the best was the chartreuse, not so much because of the color itself but because of the chutzpah of the color- you really have to be somebody to wear chartreuse, and she was somebody. She wore it like other women wear navy, or gray. I saw her one morning waiting to cross Venizelou, a sack of oranges her net shopping bag, in that chartreuse caftan and large sunglasses, all poise in the sunlight. She smiled and waved. She made the whole neighborhood feel more glamorous. 

Is being beautiful a pre-requisite for living a grand life? Well, it can't hurt. Just last night I was at the cinema and Claudia Cardinale was playing. She must be close to 80, and I thought how beautiful women stay beautiful forever. That was just as my friend was leaving the world, her magnificent features only amplified in age by her animation and the very richness of life well-lived. As to beauty, maybe it does lend a quality of the epic to a life story. Certainly it did to hers, and we loved hearing about it.

Why all this talk of fashion, of elegance? It's hardly considered a virtue. But that's a mistake. When it's coming from someplace real, elegance expresses the highest virtue- making an occasion of life- an expression of reverence, and joy. 

She did, and will always, embody for me a particular excellence, the virtue of a life so well and gracefully and boldly lived. Eirini was someone who inspires you to make an era of your own.

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Chania Sesame Biscuits, with Cinnamon, Orange, and Clove- Memory in the Mouth.

"Mmmm...Chania...," My daughter is munching on a cookie with her eyes closed, as far away from Crete as you can get and still be in Greece. We have these simple crunchy cookies all summer long when we are in Chania- with coffee, with wine, with milk for the little ones. Three batches of messing around with some flour and oil, and I got them just right. Memory in the mouth.

Our bakery in Chania has a huge wood-burning oven. By one in the afternoon, the dishes of the neighborhood start coming out, and people come and pick them up- Gemista (stuffed vegetables), Chicken and potatoes, this being Crete of course zesty minty Boureki. The food tastes better from the romantic heat of a true hearth with wood smoke, extra seasoning from the steam of your neighbors' dishes. They make a cookie like this, and a lady comes fro Rethymnon every week to the farmers' market to sell another one. They are all over in one shape or another. What they have in common is that they are all made with olive oil because it flows like water in Crete, they have no eggs(!), and almost always they have some raki (tsicoudia).

Some shape them into rings or fanciful twists, but the sesame makes them pretty enough. I think their virtue is that you can make lots and lots of them in no time at all, because they will disappear quickly- not too sweet, not too rich, just fragrant, beguiling. A simple trick keeps them crumbly rather than tough or hard. If you never bake, these area good start-mix with your hands, no tricky shapes, and makes a ton for your minimal effort. Perfect for making with kids.

We will need:

700 g/ 6 C flour

1 1/2 tsp/ baking powder

1 1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp flaky sea salt

200 g/ 1 C sugar

Finely grated orange zest

3 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp ground cloves

240 ml/ 1 C good olive oil

200 ml/ 3/4 C fresh orange juice, plus a couple shots of raki (or vodka), more if you like. The raki burns off in the oven, evaporating, leaving the biscuits more airy and crisp.

Blend all the dry ingredients in a large bowl, rubbing the orange zest into the sugar a little as you do-

Add the oil only-

and mix with your hands until the oil is completely blended in- it will be crumbly This is the trick- the oil coats the flour grains, and keeps them from forming gluten strands when you add the liquid. 

The oil turns the flour this rich, green-tinged gold.

Now go ahead and mix in the juice and raki with your fingers, until it makes a dough that just holds together. 

Take large handfuls and shape them into flat logs. Dampen the outsides with water, and roll them to coat them completely in sesame seeds. The seeds stick easily to the damp log.

You will probably need 2 baking sheets for all the logs- I usually get about 12 logs. Now slice them on the diagonal like you are making biscotti, and give them a little space- they puff. Don't be very careful- they are a rustic shape.

Bake them at 170 C/350 f for almost a half an hour- they will have puffed, and may be a little soft still when you remove them form the oven but they will crisp as they cool.No need to use baking paper or even oil the baking sheet, but you may need to loosen a couple of them with a spatula.

Unlike most cookies, these are not better hot, and in fact are not even very god hot or freshly baked- give them an hour for the flavors to settle.

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Boureki- A Cretan Dish of Zucchini, Potatoes, Mint, and Tomato, Enriched with Butter and Goat Cheese.

Do you know how it is to meet someone for the very first time and find yourself having the warmest and liveliest of conversations, going on for hours under the stars- that strange and wonderful feeling you somehow have always known each other? Well, this is that feeling- in a dish. Even if you have never had the rich, bright, and zesty combination of butter, goat cheese, tomatoes, and mint, from the first silky mouthful it is as if you had always known it would be just like this, so fabulous, so precisely right that is somehow familiar from the first time you try it. I have made this dish many times, both here in Greece and in San Francisco and the Oregon Coast, for family and friends who know little of Greek cuisine, and the response is always ravenous delight. All of them have made it again themselves, with great success (that being the delight of the friends they served it to- is there a sweeter success for the cook?). 

This is a dish form the island of Crete, and it is fair to say that there are many versions- notably some wrapped in pastry to make a filling savory pie. Like all truly elemental pleasures, the first one is the ideal against which all others are measured. My first- therefore ideal- boureki is my mother-in-law's. And it is indeed ideal- creamy minty goat cheese sauce and little rivers of bright orange tomato-tinted oil pooling on the plate around it. The potato slices are silky in the mouth, the zucchini tender. 

The Cretan dish centers around a Cretan product- a soft goat cheese called myzythra which eclipses feta in popularity on the island. It's not always easy to get elsewhere, even in Athens (except in the spring, when the milk runs generously and the Cretans are willing to part with the excess). Almost certainly we'll make the dish with a substitution- something creamy and with a goat-cheese tang. A soft chevre- the kind that comes in a log and has no rind, works very well. But in a pinch, I have blended cottage cheese and a goats' milk feta until smooth with good results, and this is what most of my friends abroad have resorted to also. 

As a vegetarian dinner party centerpiece, it can have few equals. Your most carnivorous friends will also be delighted and sated.

We will need:

500 g/ 1 generous lb. soft goat cheese or a combination of cottage cheese and goats' milk feta

4 or 5 large potatoes

4 or 5 medium zucchini

a very large bunch of fresh mint

3 or 4 large tomatoes

125 g/ 1 stick butter

100 g/ 3/4 C flour

salt and pepper

a pinch of baking powder, if you have it, for the top crust.

Melt the butter, grate the tomatoes on the large holes of the box grater, and mix these very loosely together with the goat cheese and salt and pepper to taste (we will use a little more salt and pepper between the layers). It will be pink. Set aside a very generous cup full- we will need it for the top.

Wash the mint and chop fine. Peel the potatoes and slice them very thin- a mandoline or other slicer is very handy. Do the same with the zucchini. Put the flour into a shallow bowl so you can get at it with your fingers, and have the salt and pepper handy.

Butter a large baking dish, and arrange a single layer of potato slices on it:

Dot generously with the goat cheese/tomato mixture, shower with a handful of mint, and dust with a little flour, as though you were making scalloped potatoes, and with salt and pepper (the black pepper adds warmth and zing to the dish) with a light hand. 

Now add a single layer of zucchini slices and cover them in the same manner:

Build up layers of alternating zucchini slices and potato slices with the cheese and tomato mixture, the mint, and the flour in between each layer. No need to press them down- keep air between the layers so that the potatoes can cook through. There should be 3 or 4 layers each of zucchini and potato, and if there is any of the tomato mixture left we can use it now, along with the mixture we reserved. We will be adding flour and a pinch of baking powder to this to make a thick batter (not a dough)- as thick as one for pancakes. This we will pour over the top and it forms a crust that everyone thinks is the best part. If it looks skimpy, as often it does, grate another tomato, add some melted butter, etc. The important thing is to make sure there is plenty of it. Spread the batter generously over the top, and put it in an 180 C/375 F oven, until it looks like this:

and a small sharp knife cuts easily through the potatoes- perhaps 45 minutes, sometimes as much as an hour. Test often and take care that the potatoes are tender enough- when everyone is famished from a morning at the beach, it is easy to remove it in haste, but a too-firm potato does not make for a nice dish.

As to haste- this is of course delicious piping hot, but just as delicious very warm. If you can let it sit for ten minutes, it can be served in nice squares, and it really does deserve a pretty presentation.

One could think that the richness of the butter and the cheese would make this heavy for summer, but there is plenty of zucchini, and the brightness of the mint and the tang of the tomato lighten it tremendously. Even though this makes a large dish, I would not think of making just the one if we are more than four at the table. Although so satisfying, it has a delicacy that makes everyone want seconds of it.

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