Something has happened in Greece’s chaotic cement jungle of a capital. Until about ten years ago, regional foods rarely made their way to Athens. But the city has suddenly transformed itself from a provincial city into a sophisticated European metropolis where all the country’s regions—and all their foods—happily converge.
I think of this as I enter Manolis Androulakis’s shop, Mesogaia, on the edge of the Plaka, a quaint, labyrinthine neighborhood carved into the foothills of the Acropolis. Androulakis is coddling a few heads of basket-shaped, cave-aged graviéra cheese that have just arrived from his native Crete. The subtle scent of sheep’s-milk cheese mingles with the sweet, incenselike aromas of dried Greek sage and herbal mountain tea. “Everything starts from the earth,” says Androulakis, who gave up his career as a geophysicist to indulge his passion for food. He tilts a basket of tawny barley rusks, another Cretan specialty, toward me to sample.
“I grew up in a family that would spend the better part of Sunday afternoon driving to a certain cheesemaker’s, so I was taught early to seek out the best ingredients,” he tells me. Surrounding him are a food lover’s Greek treasures, discovered on his travels all over the country: hand-cut flat strands of pasta from the island of Tínos; thin rounds of pregrilled phyllo, made by immigrants from the Caucasus; jars of ruby-red cherries, amber strips of bitter-orange rind in syrup, and other spoon sweets glistening like stained glass; golden thyme honey from Kythera and lavender honey from the Mani; and wild greens in brine, such as Santorini caper leaves and the delicate buds of Mount Pelion pistachios.
A few years ago, it would have been impossible to find such a cornucopia here. Now, however, urban Greeks have rediscovered the flavors of the countryside they left behind a generation ago.
Not far from Androulakis’s place, Nikos Barlas and his mother, Ainie Pandia, arrange towering jars of pine honey and royal jelly (the nectar of queen bees) from their home island of Ikaria. As she stands in their two- by four-foot shop, called Gnision Esti (It Is Original), Pandia can expound in one breath on everything from the depth of flavor in a sun-dried tomato paste from Milos (which she insists you taste) to the healthfulness of the Lenten trahana, a pebble-shaped pasta from Lesbos speckled with vegetables, to her years as a TV reporter. Her son is shy by comparison—but he is a passionate beekeeper, and once he gets started on the subject he, too, can chat endlessly.
The shopkeepers of Athens are not alone. Chefs have gotten in on the act, too. Until recently, dining out in the city was almost totally limited to the traditional tavernas. Today, new upscale restaurants serving modern food that takes its cue from the provinces have enlivened a once cliché-ridden cuisine.
A short walk from Gnision Esti, Takis and Stella Perdika preside over Ouzadiko, a small ouzerie in Kolonaki, Athens’s ritzy residential area. Takis has amassed a collection of more than 250 varieties of ouzo and tsipouro (Greece’s answer to grappa), and Stella has assembled some of the finest traditional mezedes in town, little dishes mostly from her native Thessaloníki.
On the other side of Athens’s center, in a recently gentrified area known as Kerameikou, very close to the ancient Athenian cemetery (one of the city’s major archaeological sites), chef Yiannis Baxevannis has created a cuisine that is both blindly Greek and clearly contemporary—drawing on wild mountain greens such as nettles, mâche, chicories, and lemon balm, as well as other regional and seasonal products. The restaurant, called Kitrino Podilato (Yellow Bicycle), occupies a sprawling former industrial space that has been transformed into one of the chicest, most modern restaurants in town.
Greeks are traditionalists at heart, though, and they haven’t completely forfeited their old favorites. Athens is still dotted with specialty foods shops that have been run by the same families for decades, and the tavernas, serving familiar dishes in a no-nonsense atmosphere, are as vibrant as ever.
Avoid the tourist traps in the Plaka and head for Tou Xynou, a taverna that has been in the Xynos family for a century. In winter, the murals in the dining rooms transport you to the Athens of another era, and in summer, amid the jasmine vines and lush trees, you feel as though you’re in a Greek island village. The moussaka is a standard-bearer, the cabbage dolmas (stuffed grape leaves) are plump and succulent, and the deep-fried potato halves are not to be missed.
Fish tavernas abound in Piraeus, Athens’s nearby twin city and port. Most of them, though picturesque and right on the water, serve up a predictable menu of typical mezedes and grilled fish. It’s worth sacrificing the view for something better. The place I like best is Thalassinos, in the residential area of Tzitzifies, about a ten-minute taxi ride from the city center. In a decidedly low-key venue, diners sit outdoors in summer or indoors amid a collection of maritime paraphernalia and modern Greek paintings. Yiorgos Loukas and his wife, Dina, offer a catch that comes exclusively from Greek waters, and their range of mezedes is both unusual and delicious. I love their various versions of saganáki— here, usually shrimp or mussels cooked with wine and herbs or with cheese in an individual skillet. The fritters of greens and seafood are also excellent, and the grilled fish and boiled vegetable salad is a simply perfect Greek classic. In a break with tradition, Thalassinos is famous among Athenians for its decidely modern warm chocolate soufflé.
For early risers with a sense of adventure, a good option is a traditional breakfast among the sorts who spend their days hawking fish, meat, and just about everything else. Head to the extremely busy Kendriki Agora, or Central Market, a fascinating if rough-hewn area. The stalls are still quiet in the dawn hours, but you can sate your appetite in one of two ways: with a workingman’s breakfast—maybe some hearty chickpea soup, or fried fresh picarel or sardines and boiled greens—or with the breakfast of champion night owls, who are ending their day as the sun comes up and hoping to mitigate the effects of their overindulgence with a piping hot bowl of patsas, or tripe soup.
For the former, head to Diporto, a small, old mageirion (working-class restaurant) on Theatrou Street, just on the other side of Athinas Street and across the way from a corner shop that sells almost nothing but olives. Barba Mitso, the cook, started his career here a few decades ago as a busboy, only to finally buy the place himself. Diporto attracts a real cross section of the city, from local neighborhood kooks to yuppies and artsy types. If bean soup and boiled greens are not your ideal breakfast, you can certainly venture in at noontime.
If it’s tripe you’re after, though, gravitate toward the market in the wee hours. Its seedy but safe alleyways are home to three other mageiria. My favorite is called To Monastiri, or The Monastery, which sounds like someone’s idea of a joke, given the, well, unrefined environment. As in all mageiria, the kitchen is open, so you just head to the front of the restaurant, peer into the pots, and choose from a daily selection of about 20 dishes, including not only tripe soup but also the likes of stewed peas with dill; lamb and orzo casserole; and pork and greens with avgolémono (tangy egg and lemon sauce).
While you’re in the area, stop in at the quaint Stoa tou Vangeli, on Evripidou Street. Stoa refers to a kind of portico, or long cavernous entranceway, and that’s exactly where this mageirion is situated. As you walk in, you hear the chirping of a wall full of birds lined up in their cages. At one table, there will surely be a few old men, stationed there since early morning, passing their shiny copper carafe of retsina back and forth. But urban professionals also come here, for the home cooking and unselfconscious kitsch. If you savor but one dish here, make sure it is the anginares a la polita, a classic stew of artichokes, potatoes, and carrots in avgolémono.
A walk down Evripidou Street is a treat in itself. This is Athens’s spice row. Once you cross Athinas Street, you’ll pass, on the right, a few basement shops whose aroma will greet you before you reach the doorway. It’s garlic, tons of it, being tied up in those familiar ornamental braids and readied for distribution all over the city.
You might want to stop in at Elixir, where Panos Koniaris, a third-generation spice merchant, sells the best Greek herbs in the city. He speaks English and is a formidable source of information. Here, you will be able to choose from a half-dozen Greek oreganos, foraged from mountain slopes and salt-sprayed islands both. And you can learn about Cretan dictamo, the “lovers’ herb.” It’s not by chance that the place looks like an old apothecary, its dried herbs stocked in lovely deep wooden drawers—herbs play a considerable role in the country’s folk medicine.
Practically next door is Miran, not a spice vendor but a seller of something equally pungent: pastoúrma, a kind of charcuterie of air-dried beef seasoned with a thick coat of pepper, fenugreek, and other spices. You can buy a few slices and have a hotel-room picnic with some good bread and Greek cheeses—feta, kasséri, and some less familiar ones like manouri (semisoft and mild) and kopanistí (fiery and spreadable)—which you’ll be able to procure easily by backtracking a little on Evripidou, to the other side of Athinas Street. There, you’ll encounter two of the best cheesemongers in Athens: Vassilis Ziogos and Laskaris Brothers.
Street food should be part of the eating experience of every visitor to Athens, which means seeking out a rich, cheesy tyropita or a temptingly tangy souvlaki. My favorite tyropita can be found at a nondescript old-time bakery on Sarri Street (about a ten-minute walk from Evripidou), in Psirri, an area once filled with leather crafters and metalsmiths but now overtaken by bars, cafés, and faux-rustic meze restaurants (none very good). The tyropita is baked by Efstathios Tzovas, and though his sardonic humor will be lost on non–Greek speakers, his doughy feta-filled pies surmount all language barriers. Psirri is a fun place to stroll, looking through small shops for copperware and other trinkets.
Fans of handheld foods will also find bliss at Thanasis, on Mitropoleos Street, home of dripping souvlaki and gyro—skewered and grilled or sliced and roasted meat wrapped in pita. A veritable Athenian landmark, it was opened in the early 19th century by an Armenian who arrived via Turkey. (In fact, souvlaki and gyro first came to Greece with Armenian refugees.) You can either sit at one of the sidewalk tables to enjoy a whole platter of thinly sliced lamb or pork, grilled tomatoes, onions, parsley, and tsatsiki (yogurt, cucumber, and garlic sauce) with warm toasted pita, or order to go and eat on the run.
The best souvlaki, however, can be had at a seatless hole-in-the-wall known as Tou Hasapi, on Apollonos Street, at the beginning of the Plaka, just off Voulis Street. The butcher shop across the street (hasapi means “butcher”) supplies the meat for the garlicky, spicy, and well-sauced souvlaki.
Another good snack is a vegetable or cheese pie from always-packed Ariston, on Voulis Street, near Syntagma. Ariston hasn’t changed much since it first opened in 1906, the brainchild of an accomplished phyllo maker named Anastasios Lombotesis, who had emigrated from the island of Zakynthos to seek his fortune. He made it, and big, thanks largely to his first recipe: To this day, Ariston’s crisp cheese pie with its characteristic elliptical shape, homemade pastry, and simple filling of feta and myzíthra is the cornerstone of his heirs’ continued success.
What would a Greek city be without baklava? Without Greek coffee, a thin layer of froth afloat on the steaming brew, sipped slowly from a small demitasse? Without frappe, the turbopowered indigenous iced-coffee creation? (Frappe is made by shaking instant-coffee granules with sugar and ice, then adding cold water and a touch of evaporated milk.) And, finally, what would any of that be without great venues to people-watch or just read the paper?
The finest baklava in town is at Caravan. The flagship shop, on Voukourestiou Street, is my favorite. You can’t sit here, but you can buy kilos of a huge variety of jewel-size bites. There are the traditional diamonds and squares packed with walnuts and/or almonds, as well as little phyllo crowns—finger-size shirred cylinders called saraglidakia—filled with pistachios, with dried apricots, with prunes, and more. Sheep’s-milk butter perfumes every piece. My own weaknesses are the chocolaty coils and the chocolate phyllo squares (known as sokolatenio baklava).
Athens is a café society, and the cream of the crop sips at Da Capo, on Kolonaki Square. The best time to come here is in the morning, around eight o’clock, when the city’s newspaper editors, government ministers, and other power brokers gather to sip a frappe or a not-so-Greek cappuccino. The attraction at this time of the day is as much the atmosphere as the breakfast special, a chocolate-filled tsoureki (the briochelike Greek Easter bread). If you get here much past 8:45, it’s likely to be sold out.
I often find refuge at Desiree, on Dimokritou Street, off Kolonaki Square. Just about the last 1950s pastry parlor left in Athens, it’s the place to see dowagers gossiping over dainty pastries and good Greek coffee. It’s also the place to sample classic koulourakia and voutimata, lightly sweetened cookies and dunking biscuits, respectively.
Another pleasant spot for coffee—or ouzo or a light snack—is Oraia Ellas (Beautiful Greece), the café at the Center for Greek Folk Art, on Pandrossou Street. And the shops here—offering a whole range of household antiques, from island-made plates to kneading troughs and wooden bread stamps, as well as some table linens and other textiles—encourage browsing for hours.
The charms of Athens have revealed themselves to me slowly. For as long as this city has been my adopted home, it has seemed at once daunting and welcoming. So it is the hunt for its little secrets that I’ve embraced, the stripping away of layers to find the heart. That odyssey has kept Athens alive and ever fascinating for me. It will for you, too.