Greece comes alive in North Kiama with food

KATINA CURTIS

A small part of Greece has been alive in the North Kiama Neighbourhood Centre with cooking lessons that were such a success they will run again from next week.

Grace Masselos was inspired to run her own cooking course after attending a lesson in Bondi.

“I think the love of cooking has got to be passed on,” the former preschool teacher said.

“I love seeing people make new discoveries. Why not enjoy new discoveries – children do every day.”

Mrs Masselos has been teaching her small group of students the Kytherian style of Greek cuisine, which comes from the island of Kythera where her parents were born.

“I’m doing really what mum used to do. Although I didn’t take much notice at the time, I’m finding as long as I have a recipe a lot is coming back,” she said.

“The beauty of all these recipes is you can adapt them. It’s all very basic food you can grow in your backyard; it’s like the original organic.”

As well as recipes, Mrs Masselos has taught her students a bit of Greek history, language and culture.

Each class starts off with a serving of “spoon sweets” – things like sour cherries, preserve lemon and loukoumi or Turkish delight – and a nip of liqueur, as one would receive upon visiting a Greek home

Greek music livens the room as Mrs Masselos encourages her students to pronounce the proper Greek names of the foods they are cooking.

“We’re all food lovers and we’re all travellers and we wanted to know some of the techniques for the delights and it’s so great to learn it from a Greek person and get all the culture as well,” student Cheryl Pearce said.

“We’ve all learnt so much. For instance, I’ve been buying these things for years and just spreading them on toast and now I realise they’re probably spoon sweets.”

Mrs Pearce said she had travelled to Santorini and Athens and so, having had a taste of it, jumped at the chance to learn how to cook the cuisine.

“Really, they’ve developed a cuisine that’s so easy, so manageable – no wonder they’re happy!” she said.

During the four-week course, the students have learnt to make spanakopita, souvlakia, dolmathes, salads, galataboureko (custard pie), moussaka, kourabiethes (shortbread), baklava and kataifi.

“My favourite to cook is moussaka and kourabiethes because everyone enjoys them so much,” Mrs Masselos said. “You really enjoy your cooking when there are other people enjoying it too.”

The classes finish with a feast of what was cooked that day, so the students get a chance to share the enjoyment of their cooking.

Mrs Masselos was so pleased with the success of the classes that she has organised another one starting next Friday and is putting together an evening course for October.

For more details, contact the neighbourhood centre on 4237 8422.