O Naftis

I can think of better names for a fish restaurant than "O Naftis" (The Sailor) and I can certainly name a dozen places with more pleasant design than O Naftis, in Halandri, but despite some of the drawbacks the food here, while simple and straightforward, was surprisingly good.

O Naftis is housed on the ground floor of an existing restaurant, Manteio, right on Palaiologou, the main street. It is a little confusing. When you walk in you aren’t quite sure what restaurant you are walking into but you do notice right away the colors of the sea and the motifs of a ship in the back. That’s O Naftis. Wooden floors, maritime paraphernalia right down to the bousoula, and paintings of sea life, boats, etc. attempt to create a certain atmosphere. Rolled up sails divide the seating areas. The tables are colored in Aegean-blue tablecloths and the chairs are upholstered in white. The place is cramped with lots of furniture. By the looks of it, O Naftis doesn’t quite seem like a great port of call.

On the other hand, we had a very good meal here. A gilt-head bream (tsipoura) ran 60 euros a kilo and was wild and grilled perfectly, tender, juicy, delicious. A homemade taramosalata with white tarama (carp roe) was delicious, looser than the usual stodgy stucco that is more potato or bread than fish eggs that one finds in so many seafood places. We tried a dish of tiny fried squid, which were perfectly fried, too, not at all greasy, crisp, well-seasoned and tasty. The grilled mussels had a lovely texture and the pan juices that they rested on were very good. There are some other, rare, offerings that we didn’t sample, including the king crabs (vasiliko kavouri) and a host of shellfish, among them razor clams (petrosolines). The rest of the menu includes a classic array of Greek fish and seafood cookery, especially as it’s represented in tavernas: shrimps fried, grilled, and cooked as saganaki; mussels saganaki; anchovies (gavros) both marinated and fried; and various seafood-themed salads. Main courses besides whole fresh fish include lobster and shrimp pasta. We ordered a wintry boiled vegetable salad and relished the flavor of this humble place’s excellent olive oil, “from somewhere in the Peloponnese,” as the owner cryptically said.

This is a place for groups of friends who want an old-fashioned taverna, before the age when designers set the tone for restaurants, where the food is simple, straightforward and good.

Cuisine: classic fish and seafood taverna with an excellent hand at the grill

Athens Area: northern suburbs

Decor-Atmosphere: pre-design age room like the tavernas of a generation ago

Service: friendly and accomodating

Wine List: limited but competent

Prices: 35-55 euro a person

Address: 15A, Konstantinou Palaiologou str., Halandri

Telephone: 210-6810570

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Dosirak

Dosirak

I thought I had exhausted the Asian restaurants in the vicinity of Syntagma, mainly as a frequent customer at Furin Kazan and the noodle shop diagonally up the street on Apollonos street. But Dosirak, while it hadn’t quite escaped me, was not on my radar screen until my friend E mentioned it was her new favorite sushi place. Dosirak is not run by Japanese, but by Koreans, who also have a tradition of sushi. It’s a family restaurant and the family’s daughter, born and raised here, speaks perfect Greek. On a Thursday night, the place was busy. On a Friday night, the waitress had to turn away group after group. This place is popular among a certain set—hip Greeks without very deep pockets, hip foreigners, and Asians. We had a very good meal.

Dosirak is simply but pleasantly appointed. Paper lanterns protrude from holes in the ceiling in an attractive, comforting way, casting a warm glow over the lean room. A few touches of wood and black make up the basic design elements, lending a clean, uncluttered air to the place. The kitchen is visible, busy, but not intrusive on the rest of the space. The tables are spaced well apart despite the small room.

Korean specialties like kimchi (a kind of vegetable) and excellent barbecue are among the signatures on this menu. We tried the Korean bulgogi, a savory mixture of thinly sliced beef and onions. The dish is not much to look at but the onions give it a pleasant sweetness. The seaweed salad is really a mixed green salad with a little seaweed, in the form of thinly shredded, tasty strands, added to it. It’s fine—a little underseasoned that night. There is a fairly large noodle selection and some unusual meat specialties, among which is a duck teriyaki (skewers of duck) and a Korean fried pork called Tonkatsu. I wanted something light and went for the sashimi, large platter, with 21 pieces, much of it tuna and salmon. It was fresh and tender but could possibly have been a touch colder. The royal crunch maki, which my friend shamelessly indulged in, is a large roll of rice and seafood with a sesame-seaweed ring that holds the whole thing together.

Dosirak is a restaurant that speaks tomes about how this city has changed. Just up the street is one of the most traditional Greek tavernas and just about the only place worth eating Greek food in the environs of Plaka. But this particular corner of Voulis and Apollonos have become a kind of little Asia, with a grocer and a few restaurants all within a minute’s walk of one another.

Cuisine: Korean specialties, Sushi and other Asian dishes.

Athens area: Syntagma 

Decor-Atmosphere: Simple, lean, pleasant.

Service: Good

Wine List: Competent for a place that is out of the Greek loop. Try the beers instead.

Prices: 25-35 euro per person

Address: 33, Voulis str., Syntagma 

Telephone: 210-3233330, 210-3233396 

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Bacaro

Bacaro

Boy was it a night to remember. We had gone to see the award-winning “future of Greek cinema,” Kynodontas (Dogtooth), after reading more than a few amazing reviews. We left the theatre really pissed off, in a really bad mood, feeling as though we had just spent two hours inside the disturbed, deranged mind of someone in desperate need of some serious psychotherapy. (That said, the film left a dent in my conscience; it is memorable and highly original). We needed a little fun. The bars on Christou Lada str. were already packed—maybe with earlier movie-goers in need of some alcohol to relieve—pun intended—something worse than a toothache. We headed to Bacaro, in a stoa off Sofokleous Street and readied ourselves for a party.

Bacaro is an unusual place. It’s situated both inside the stoa and inside a regular space. There is live music on the weekends. The band that night was impressive. A Nigerian singer rapped in perfect Greek and bounced around to the well-honed rhythms of the jazz-funk group. We drank and ate and drank and ate in a conscious effort to fix our collective mood.

The food at Bacaro is pretty good! The starters are all artfully presented and tasty. Even simple dishes such as the small pita wedges with tomato, grilled haloumi cheese and basil purée looked pretty and tasted good. A napoleon of grilled vegetables and manouri cheese was balanced and robust, with a balsamic dressing. The savory loukoumades (dough fritters) filled with cheese and dressed with honey and sesame were delicious, a definite advance on the cheese croquette theme that was once part of every menu in town.

I liked the Caesar’s salad, despite the fact that it wasn’t quite authentic. The anchovies were, if not absent completely, then very hard to see or taste. The bacon added a tangy note in their place. Other salads included an arugula and cherry tomato mélange, with sliced olives, grilled haloumi, and sun-dried tomato vinaigrette; spinach and carrot salad with mushrooms, sesame, prosciutto and honey vinaigrette; and a mixed winter salad with oranges, gorgonzola, hazelnuts and berry vinaigrette.

The linguine with vegetables, thyme, roasted tomatoes and manouri was very nice. Other pasta and risotto selections included penne with salmon and saffron, an interpretation of carbonara with bacon, mushrooms, zucchini and tarragon, and a risotto with marinated zucchini, dry vermouth and thyme.

Main courses included grilled chicken with honey-mustard sauce, beef fillet with wine sauce, pork loin stuffed with smoked metsovone cheese and eggplant purée, and a cheese burger.

We didn’t try the main courses, but with all that we did eat we drank a delicious bottle of Refosco, then another, and another. Numbed to the pain of an aching Dogtooth, we swayed to the music and enjoyed the rest of the night.

Cuisine: Mediterranean grazing food, perfect for the venue

Athens Area: Athens downtown

Decor-Atmosphere: Easy, casual fun in a great little downtown restaurant-cabaret

Service: Professional

Prices: 30-40 euro per person, with wine

Address: Sofokleous 1, Athens center

Telephone: 210- 3211882

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Pantos Kairou

My sister had been telling me about this little place for ages. She spends half the year here in Greece, a good part of it in Piraeus, and she is on a constant search for the holes in the wall with good home cooking so she doesn’t have to do it herself. Pantos Kairou, which more or less translates as “For Every Season,” is a small, modern meze restaurant in the heart of Piraeus, diagonally across the street from the Demotiko Theatro (the huge old public theatre that is now undergoing renovation). It’s on a small pedestrian path. The main dining area is done up in pale shades of yellow, peach and beige, with warm lighting and a pared down contemporary look, almost Swedish modern. The look belies the totally authentic, classic, very well-executed Greek cuisine that comes out of the kitchen. The only giveaway that there is something comfortingly old-fashioned about this place is the collection of antique toy cars and vespas on the shelves, which occupied my eight-year-old son’s interest for most of our lovely meal. I saw lots of women back there and one guy the Sunday afternoon we went. This might sound sexist, but I could tell there was a woman’s hand preparing some of the food we tried. Lunch started with a delicious plate of grilled, marinated pleurotus mushrooms that were meaty without being tough. The fava (yellow split pea purée) was one of the best I’ve ever had. The yellow split peas were puréed to a soft, velvety texture, drizzled with a little green extra-virgin olive oil, and served forth in a compartmentalized plate, so that garnishes—raw red onion, capers, and green olives—were separate. You spooned what you liked on top of your own portion. The arugula salad was less democratic. This came already dressed—a little overdressed—in a strong balsamic dressing with long strips of parmesan and clumps of soft myzithra cheese tossed into the salad. It was a little too acidic. One of the things I always hanker after in tavernas and small meze places is one of the things I rarely cook at home: batter-fried salt cod and skordalia (garlic dip). At Pantos Kairou, the cod was perfect. It had been desalted to just the right degree and was juicy, so that you got both the crunch of a perfectly fried batter crust and a tender piece of fish inside. The skordalia was mild, smooth, and made with potatoes. A litmus test for me when I eat in tavernas is the bifteki (a Greek burger). The one here is tender and tasty. The only dish I did not like were the fries, another test for any kitchen. I think these were precut, judging from their size and shape. That’s not so much the issue—they were soft and soggy and underseasoned. Dessert is on the house: an old-fashioned piece of kormos—that’s Greek for trunk, as in tree trunk, as in a sweet made of broken up biscuits, butter, and chocolate, shaped into a log and cut into thin marbled pieces. It came doused in commercial chocolate sauce. It would have been better naked!
We had a couple carafes of the house red and white wines and, most importantly, satisfied my sister’s desire to have a home cooked meal—just not in her own home! Would I come back here again? Yes…

Cuisine: Traditional Greek cooking

Athens Area: Center of Piraeus

Decor-Atmosphere: Simple, modern
Service: Homey
Prices: 15-20 euro a person

Address: Ag. Konstantinou 5, Demotiko Theatro, Pireaus

Telephone: 210-4220222

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Oikeio

In one week’s time I had the experience of dining on traditional cuisine revisited (Milton’s in the Plaka) and on traditional cuisine more or less the way our parents and grandparents know it, at Oikeio in Kolonaki. Expecting to fall in love with the fashionista version of Greek cooking, I found myself instead liking the comforts of well-known dishes simply prepared and served forth in a hip, obviously popular place right in the heart of the city. Oikeio has been going strong for a few years now, luring in the young jet set from Kolonaki and beyond with what could be aptly described as Greek soul food. Oikeio means familiar, and that's exactly what is serves forth: the familiar Greek food that makes up the repertoire of classic fare.

Indeed, the menu is a manifesto—literally—about what food means in Greek culture, with quotes by Kazantzakis, a brief history of bread, rice, olive oil, spoon sweets, wine, and more. It’s like a newspetter, in fact, with an article on food in the movies and on books of note. Too much to read while having dinner, especially in extremely crowded quarters where you can barely spread your elbows or fit the bread basket on the table, so I took it home…

Oikeio is like an over-filled house of nostalgic objects, put together like organized chaos, all of which somehow works. It is crowded and the tables are too close together—they seated three of us at a table upstairs that barely fit one. But the food is simple and good, just what it promises to be. The prices are right, too, especially surprising given the high-rent location on the corner of Ploutarchou Street.

Homemade savory pies, various salads (small portions), grilled brizoles, chicken breasts, biftekia, and a slew of daily specials make up the menu. We tried the coiled yogurt pie, the filling of which was a combination of yogurt and cheese. This is the kind of dish that’s easy to like even if it’s not superb—dough, cheese, fat, the trio that attracts most of the human race. The boiled vegetable salad was a surprisingly small portion, with zucchini, carrots and a few other things cut coin-size. It was so small we ended up ordering another salad, too, the Oikeio, with spinach, celery, tomatoes and haloumi. That came in a small portion, too. I ordered that day’s fish special—anchovies (gavros) in the oven with coriander. I liked it even though I was hoping to see fresh coriander and not the seeds. But it was fine, exactly the kind of thing that might come out of someone’s home oven on a weekday night. The octopus with short pasta was also homey and, well, oikeio. The tsipoura filet was less successful. It came wrapped in grape leaves but looked very tired when it arrived. The flavor was ok. The bulgur salad that accompanied it was good.

I liked Oikeio but think I’d like it even more for lunch when it is a little less crowded and noisy. Is it a sign of the times that on a Tuesday night it was mobbed?

Cuisine: Classic Greek home cooking

Athens Area: Kolonaki

Decor-Atmosphere: Like being in someone's living room

Service: Harried but friendly

Prices: 25 euro a person

Address: Ploutarhou 15

Telephone: 210 72 59 216

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Cine...Gefseis

One Friday night, I thought it would be fun to take a friend who’s in the film business up to the place called Cine…Gefseis. I don’t know exactly what I imagined—a place whose menu comes from meals we’ve seen in movies? A place with old Greek movies playing in the background, loops of dining and cooking scenes? Was it a novel concept, like the dinner theater called Rouf Train, which is something of a food cult experience in Athenian dining circles?

Cine…Gefseis is in the main square of Kefalari. It turns out that just a few months ago, this restaurant was something else, different name, different concept, one to which the chef Yiannis Baxevanis had lent his name and menu ideas (MoMo). That apparently didn’t work and so a face lift ensued.

The long, deep space is modern and neutral in design. No great transportive feeling like the one you get from watching a good movie, takes you over here. Instead, it’s very well-lighted. I felt the way I sometimes feel when I walk into a small Greek clothing store with the salesperson hovering nearby, watching your every move. The names of each item come from movies of Greek cinema glory days. Stella fyge, kratao…("Stella, Get Out of the Way, I'm Holding a Knife") for example, is a boiled vegetable salad. The kitrina gantia ("Yellow GLoves") is fava (Greek yellow split pea puree). Mia Italida ap’ tin Kypseli ("An Italian Girl from Kypseli") is grilled vegetables. That's about the extent of the movie industry's influence on the menu. 

The titles might be humorous to a Greek who knows them, but the food is boring in every language. A salad of fresh greens, dried fruit, and pear vinaigrette was drenched in dressing and busy. The grilled talagani cheese, a new cheese from the Peloponnese, was hard to mess up: a disk of cheese slapped on the grill. OK. H Kori mou y Socialistria ("My Daugher the Socialist") is a plate filled with small Cretan greens pies (hortopitakia) and these were ok but far from homemade. A braised lamb dish seasoned with rosemary and Mavrodafne wine sounded promising but disappointed because the flavors were bland.

So, Cine…Gefseis is hardly a show worth watching. Whoever is directing this performance doesn’t have a clear idea of what he wants to do. The plot's not interesting. If menu items are the cast in a restaurant, then the actors need rehearsing—better delivery is badly needed.

Cuisine: Greek
Athens Area: Northern suburbs, Kifissia
Decor-Atmosphere: Neutral modern
Service: Fine
Wine List: Small, mainly Greek, with some Italian labels
Prices: 35-40 euro a person
Address: 37, Kolokotroni str., Kefalari, Kifissia, tel. 2106234074

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Noor

I loved the wallpaper! Vivid scenes of the Taj Mahal in all the reds, yellows, and oranges of India adorn one entire wall at Noor, a small, odd little restaurant in Metaxourgeio, a gritty neighborhood in downtown Athens. Indian (or Pakistani?) television shows aired on two flat-screen TVs overhead. As we dined on vindaloo, subcontinent dancers bobbed and wiggled to the flow of Indian pop music, with partners who would make Tom Jones proud. Noor, which means light in English, is one of a number of “authentic” Indian-Pakistani restaurants in a part of the city that is home to a budding population of Asian immigrants.

Let’s get this straight: Noor is not the kind of place you’d take your parents for Sunday brunch, but it is the kind of place you might go with a few adventurous friends, especially if they’ve spent time in the UK and are inured to the spicy, aromatic foods of Pakistan and India. The clientele was unusual for Athens. Several Greek women in the company of the owner, a table of American women, possibly students, with whom the owner, in lilting but very good Greek and equally good English, sat most of the night. And us, four middle-aged Greeks and one English long-time Athens resident, discussing the Greek elections on its eve. The décor is a hodgepodge of stuff put together more out of need than driven by a sense of aesthetics. Noor is a classic immigrant restaurant, the kind my grandparents would have opened two generations ago in an equally seedy part of New York City. The food was decent and the prices amazingly cheap.

All the classics of Indian Export cuisine are on the menu, with dishes slathered in thick tomato-based sauces each of which looks exactly the same but varies in degree of heat. The samosas filled with vegetables were a little on the heady, oily side. I liked the raita, the Indian/Pakistani yogurt dip similar to tzatziki minus the garlic. The papadam, thin wafers of spicy fried cracker bread, were a little greasy, but not bad. The nan, a kind of pillowy pita bread, was great for sopping up those sauces of varying spiciness.

The owner was honest in what and how much we should order, steering us away from too much. A few appetizers and three main courses for five people turned out to be perfect. I liked the pashwari nan, a thin flat soft bread filled flavored with sweet onions, sugar and cinnamon. The sweetened pilaf, with pistachios and a hint of orange, was pretty good, plainer than other versions I’ve had but somehow “real.” We ordered a spicy lamb vindaloo, doused in thick sauce and spicy without being anywhere near overwhelming. The madras chicken looked kind of the same but tasted a little more tomatoey. The tandoori lamb came with a side sauce of curry.

At the end of our meal, and after more than a few carafes of box wine from Thebes, the owner brought us a plate of Pakistani sweets, shaped like eggs and bright as Neon. These are too foreign for my baklava-honed palate to enjoy.

Noor isn’t the best “authentic” Indian restaurant I’ve been to in downtown Athens. The fun here wasn’t so much in the gastronomic experience of eating exotic food prepared by a native, but rather in eating it on the eve of a pivotal event in an area of Athens that epitomizes the changes this city and society have undergone in the last decade. As we walked back to the Metaxourgeio train station, someone had just gotten stabbed on the sidewalk.

Cuisine: Subcontinent specialties in a classic immigrant restaurant
Athens Area: center, Metaxourgeio metro station
Decor-Atmosphere: Islamabad meets Metaxourgeio

Service: Fine for what it is
Wine List: Wine and beer
Prices: 15 euro a person
Address: 43, Deligiorgi str., Metaxourgeio (close to the Metaxourgeio Metro Station), tel. 2105246644

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Vardis

It’s not every day I splurge on a meal at Vardis, one of several Michelin-starred restaurants in Athens, but I did a few nights ago with friends. I had been wanting to try the cooking of the young chef Asterios Koustoudis for a while, having heard lots and even written some about him.

On a Wednesday night in this nervous, tired pre-election town, Vardis was pretty quiet. Nine of us in total occupied the stately dining room. Our meal started with a glass of champagne and a plate of small amuses-bouche that included a chick pea “button,” a small, crisp, frilly tyropita (cheese pie), and a fish tidbit that seemed to me like a tiny take on the classic psari magioneza (fish with mayonnaise) that once probably ruled dining rooms in the nearby vicinity.

An offering from the kitchen arrived next: foamy but thick eggplant “soup,” with a dollop of yogurt. It was a tad too sour for my taste buds, but I am one known to add a pinch of sugar to most eggplant dishes, so the comment might be a purely personal one. We ordered a range of starters and main courses that covered fish, meat, and vegetables.

The eggplant, tomato, mozzarella tart was strange to me and less refined than I expected: shaped into a large mound, about the size of a hamburger, and looking a little spongy, covered with a layer of cheese. The pastry base was, indeed, not the crunchy kind promised in its description on the menu, but soggy and dense. It didn’t work for me. I tried the homemade pasta with calamari and chutney made with salami from Lefkada. The combination intrigued me and it actually worked, but again the plate was more rustic in its appearance than I expected. It was not a beautiful dish. The interpretation of a Horiatiki salata (Greek village salad) was much prettier and tasty.

We ordered two fish and one meat main course. My fish came out lukewarm: a good sized sfyrida (grouper) nicely presented with a spoonful of roasted eggplant purée and a very tasty tomato confit. I just wish it had been hot! The grilled fillet of sole with avgotaraho (botargo) and vegetables was not the winner we had hoped, a little bland but artfully grilled, no easy feat I suppose for such a delicate fish. The gourounopoulo (piglet), a hefty portion for a restaurant of this caliber, with bulbous caramelized onions, was tasty.

I was surprised by a few other things on the menu, for example, the mention of “agourelaio” (early-harveste olive oil) in at least one dish. How can that be—it was late September! If it’s last year’s it’s not agouro (immature) any more, but, well, “aged.” Ditto on a few other ingredients, such as zucchini blossoms, that belong on an early-summer menu. Maybe I am nitpicking, and I don’t want to because the chef is so simpatico and so earnest and devoted and serious and humble, all things that don’t make me feel good about writing what I feel!

Desserts: these were good, especially the Mastiha ice cream with ginger over the thinnest, crispest layer of kantaifi pastry. I loved the super bitter summer chocolate dessert, despite its very wintry richness. The lemon sorbet and the orange sorbet with honey were delicious. The lemon cream more staid.

Cuisine: Refined Greco-Mediterranean that the Michelin man likes!
Athens Area: Northern suburbs, Kifissia
Decor-Atmosphere: Stately, refined, very quiet
Service: Very good
Wine List: Very good
Prices: très cher! 60 to 70 a person sans vin (wine)
Address: 66, Diligianni str., Pentelikon Hotel, Kefalari, Kifissia, tel. 2106230650-6 

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Pasional

Some restaurant locations just seem jinxed. These venues can't seem to house a business for more than a few months. I have one friend in the business who promised himself years ago he’d never open a place where another had failed.

But then there are exceptions.

Pasional, on Κapodistriou Street in Filothei, occupies a space that two other restaurant operators tried to succeed in but didn’t. Somehow, this place feels different though. On a recent Tuesday night, not a great night for eating out anywhere in Athens, Pasional was pretty busy. They’ve done a great job of renovating the place and have managed to create an atmosphere that’s totally in sync with the concept: Argentina. The décor is pleasantly baroque, done up in black and burnished gold, with ornate mirrors, waiters donning black ribbon ties, and pictures of an Argentina that captures our imagination. They’ve created a feel that works. The finishing touch is the grand piano replete with a singer who serenades well into the night as couples dance.

I liked the fact that whoever designed the place and the menu had something very specific in mind and stuck with it even through the wine list, which is 100% Argentinian and ranges in price from the low 20s to more than 150 euro. Something for everyone.

Considering the area, which is on the periphery of one of Athens' poshest suburbs, the place is reasonably priced. Three of us shared appetizers, one huge 700 g piece of beef, and a 32 euro bottle of Malbec for about 33 euros each. Prices go up the more carnivorous your leanings. (Meat runs between 15 and 30 or so euros per portion).

We started with the empanadas, which are like Greco-Turkish boreks, filled with ground meat or chicken. They were competent, but not especially memorable (a little dry). The provoleta, a plate of tomatoes and melted cheese was what it promised to be: meltingly attractive to this cheese lover. The salad Pasional was an overflowing plate of all sorts of vegetables, including hearts of palm.

Argentinian barbecue – parilla – plays prominently on the menu and we went for the 'oura kilotou' (rump), a piece of boneless meat the size of Argentina, which was cooked exactly to our specs (medium rare) but a little underseasoned (it needed more salt).

I liked the simplicity of the menu and its small size, which to me always means a conservative, careful approach to the food that is coming out of the kitchen. Carnivorous northern suburbanites beware: Pasional is poised to become the neighborhood steakhouse.

Cuisine: Carnivorous pleasures from the land of the gauchos

Athens Area: northern suburbs, Filothei

Decor-Atmosphere: Argentinian concept, black and gold, baroque and inviting, piano and singer

Service: Good

Wine List: Argentinian wines only

Prices: 35-50 euro a person

Address: 54, Kapodistriou str., Filothei, tel. 2106800200

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Selene

It’s a sad fact that residents of Santorini have done more to destroy the island than earthquakes ever could and sadder still that they continue to rip the soul out of this magical place by erecting ever more spectacularly ugly buildings. Get rid of the tour buses that choke local roads, scale things down to the island’s natural pace, and take a lesson from one of the few local business people who have managed to retain both a sense of exquisite taste and refinement for more than two decades now: long-time restaurateur Yiorgos Hatziyanakis, whose 25-year-old Selene is better than ever.

Hatziyanakis is one of Greece’s first professional “locavores,”—someone who sought out the island’s foods and food products long before it was fashionable to do so and with those simple foods he forged a gourmet restaurant that remains one of this country’s gastronomic destinations. This year he brought in one of Greece’s most talented young chefs, Constantina Faklari, who seems, in just a short time, to have understood the pared down essence of this island and manages to manifest it in her cooking. In a two day visit, during which time we sampled almost everything on the menu, one dish was better than the next.

Selene is blessed with a stellar view of the Caldera, sunsets to croon over, and cocktails to set the mood for things to come. I loved the pepper-studded Tselepos champagne (by a respected producer in Mantineia, Peloponnese), but was even more impressed with the soumada-vodka-mint-crushed ice creation of longtime hostess Yeorgia. It was delicious.

Our meal began with a selection of starters. The sea urchin and grilled artichoke was a favorite. The artichokes, crunchy as a pumice stone, paired beautifully with the unctuous texture of the sea urchin. Both were tempered by a smooth as silk fava cream and an airy lemon foam. The octopus carpaccio, shaped like a mound over smoky eggplant puree, was another sensuous pleasure, a marriage of taste and texture that I could have savored all night. Faklari marries the common with the eclectic, like her raw zucchini “spaghetti” with botargo jelly, an exercise in reining in the natural unctuousness of the botargo with nature’s most water-filled vegetable. The cold tomato soup with ice cream made of Ios goat’s milk is superb—the chef likes ice creams of all sorts and plays with them artfully. We tried two dishes that were remakes of stuff she was doing at Urban, her last post in crowded downtown Athens: a take on shrimp Saganaki with feta panacotta and a giant bean and cured fish salad. The shrimp Saganaki was presented in an almost painterly way and was a masterful approach to this often stodgy dish, but the giant beans with home-cured lakerda (salted tunny) were Greek food at its best: minimal, earthy, direct. A fava tart has been on Selene’s menu for a long time, but was definitely rougher around the edges before the chef’s intervention. Now it’s playful but classy, with a sunnyside up egg baked into the golden tart. She marries it with a succulent smoked quail.

Those, dear readers were the starters! Main courses that we sampled included a simple but elegant briam baked in phyllo with xinomyzithra quenelles. The seafood ravioli, which comes as two separate pieces of large pasta between which are nestled finely diced summer vegetables, fennel and seafood, is luxurious but also simple. The monkfish and langoustine orzo is another simple, elegant dish that won us over. The cod—that was among my favorites. Crisply fried without a trace of oil and served with three painterly mounds of smoked eggplant and tomato sauce. The piglet, a slow-cooked tender as a baby’s bottom piece of meat comes with an intoxicating side of apple-vyssino (sour cherry) purée.

I could go on, but room won’t permit, so I’ll mention but one of the handful of desserts: a milk chocolate Semifreddo wrapped in sweet white eggplant preserves and served with a fantastic vanilla-arbaroriza (rose geranium) sauce. That dish speaks tomes for both Hatziyanaki’s and Faklari’s culinary aesthetics: respect local foods and make them shine, excel at the art of seasoning with Greek herbs, and stay grounded while flying high.

Cuisine: Greek cooking befitting the magic of this island
Area: Cyclades islands in the Aegean
Decor-Atmosphere: A jewel in every way
Service: Excellent
Wine List: Paean to local wines as well as to Greek wines
Prices: 70+ euro a person
Address: Fira, Santorini, tel. 22860 22249 

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