My love of tomatoes is the reason why I started eating Greek salads in the first place. I was in Greece, and "salad" was the only thing I could somewhat recognize on the menu. I had heard about Greek salads before, but never actually tried one.
A REAL GREEK SALAD is nothing like what the majority of restaurants serve here in Canada. There are THREE main differences, which are as follows:
- The salads consist of tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, red onion, and NO lettuce! (If they are putting lettuce in there, it's a filler because they are too cheap to buy enough fresh vegetables, and it is NOT a "Greek" salad!)
- Oil, vinegar, and oregano are the only acceptable dressings (except maybe another type of seasoning.)
- Feta cheese MUST be present in some way, shape or form. I mostly saw a large block of feta placed on top of the salad, but already crumbled and mixed in is also acceptable, yet not recommended.
If a salad does not follow all three of the above criteria, it is not a traditional Greek salad.
MY QUEST: Over the next two years, as I plow my way through CreComm, I will rate every Greek salad that I eat. I will try as many restaurants as possible, and I will report my findings, both positive and negative. I will provide a "quality analysis" of each salad, and will then provide an overall score out of 5. My quality analysis will take into consideration the following aspects:
- Vegetable usage (variety of different kinds)
- Oil and vinegar presentation (is it already put on the salad, or do I have the opportunity to do so myself)
- Feta organization (large cube or small pieces)
- Freshness (are all of the ingredients fresh, or do they look like leftovers from other dishes or other days)
- Presentation (does this look like a salad I want to marry)
After going through the above checklist, I will give a final rating out of five:
- 5 - the salad is absolutely fabulous, and I forgot that I was back in Canada while eating it
- 4 - above average, no complaints
- 3 - fine, it's a salad
- 2 - could use some work
- 1 - i'm slightly depressed about my salad experience
- 0 - i'm going to slap the chef and cry in a corner
If you know of a Greek salad I should look into, please send me a comment and let me know. I visited the Princess Street Breakfast & Lunch place a few weeks ago, and tried their Greek salad. Unfortunately, I would only give it a 2 out of 5. Not a great start...
Ah, yes, the perfect Greek Salad. It was so much fun watching you eat your way through Athens, Santorini and Mykonos this summer. You really DID fall in love with a traditional Greek Salad. I was quite amazed to see them serve the feta in one big slice - yet found it quite appetizing served this way. One could eat as little or as much of the feta with each bite - you alone controlled the portion entering into your mouth. One ingredient you forgot to mention is the beautiful black greek olive, usually with a pit, not without. But I will forgive this oversight, because you do not like olives! And this is one of the reasons why we made the perfect pair for travelling and eating in Greece - you automatically gave me your black olives and I automatically gave you the majority of my tomatoes. I prefer a Greek salad where you still have to do a little work - cut the cucumber and tomatoe into smaller pieces. I can't stand where it is alamost diced. And that is why I do not rate the Greek salad at Kristina's on Corydon too high - I give them a 3 out of 5: the veggies are cut too small and the feta is asif someone took a beautiful big piece of it and tried to see how many little fragments they could pulverize it into. Marion Warhoft may not approve of my description, but it IS accurate.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy your trek through teh Greek Salads of this city - I'd liek to seehow you rate the ones servved at Homer's on Ellice and Pembina Village on, you guessed it, Pembina Hwy!
I to Amanda am a lover of the Greek Salad. Hence the reason every year I grow a variety of different shapes and sizes of tomatoes. This year I was lucky enough to find a couple of heirloom plants, one turned out with kind of a striped tomatoe in the orange, yellow family of colors. So next year maybe grow some of your own tomatoes. There really is nothing better than fresh picked!!!!! (Sandi)
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