This is the eighth of a ten part series on dining on the Greek island of Samos. I have now been there three times for stays of a month or more. I have painted on each stay. Here is a link to the last ten paintings I did in 2014. This time has also has given me a chance to sample many of the great restaurants on the island. The first three posts look at the smaller mountain villages and seaside towns. The larger towns are now be covered in individual posts. I started with Mytilini, the largest of the mountain towns and then Karolvasi, Pythagora, and Samos Town.
The island also has great local produce, meat, and fish and we did a lot of cooking at our friend’s home in Mytilini where we stayed. There was a grill in the back and a full kitchen. Below you can first see eggplant and calamari on the grill, then the results. Next there is grilled zuchinni. Then there is a photo of another grilling of chicken and potatoes and the results. We got fresh fish from a man who drove a truck with his daily catch by our house each day. He announced his catch through a loud speaker. We did not know the Greek words but could juts pick out our choices from the iced selection in the back of his truck. Here you see a fish about to be cleaned. The calamari also came from him. We found several videos on how to clean them on YouTube. You can see him and his truck in the next post on food providers.
The fish below came fromt he fish truck and was grilled. the pork came from the local meat market as did the chicken above. The pork below had garlic from the produce store embeeded in it and was grilled with onions.
There was a wonderful bakery just around the corner which is shown in the next post. We often got breakfast pastries. The bread shown was sliced and grilled. The pastry is served with some fresh peaches we got at a roadside stand. There was an excellent produce store where we got these tomatoes and much more. I made paintings from many of the fresh fruits and vegetables. The last post in this series shows the produce and the paintings they inspired. Occasionally, a produce man could drive through town (shown in the next post) and we could buy fresh fruit and vegetables from the back of his truck.
Many people have their own chickens. We also made a quiche fromn the fresh egggs we got from a friend's chickens. The island produces the best tasting potatoes I have had anywhere. They became the source for a number of dishes inlcudidng the garlic and onion fried potatoes shown below. Below these are one of the fresh eggs with left over fired potatoes and an eggplant tomato cheese pie made from all local products.