Portions portions portions!

Apparently that's what everybody keeps telling us we need to improve on.  And they are right.  Not making excuses or anything but it is hard for greeks to come up with portions.  The reason?  Because we always cook WAAAAY too much food!  There are always leftovers.  Always!  Also...we go by what we say "with the eye".  If I ask my mom how much water do you add or how much flour does this dough contain she casually respond "I don't know...measure with the eye".  That means one thing...you decide!  But of course not everybody can decide.  Especially if people are cooking a specific type of food for the first time.  So people who keep scolding us about our portions...they are right.  We need to improve on our portion measurements.  Which means that from now on when we give you a recipe we will do our best to say for how many people it is.  We will our best! :)  
Like I said in one of our previous blogs, we will be doing some appetisers for our friend Mark who is interested in making them himself.  Appetisers in Greece are called meze.  Now, we know they are called like that in Turkish and in Lebanese and meze is not a Greek word to begin with.  However, we have been influenced and influenced as well the cuisine of neighbouring countries.  So let's meze!
For the this meze I decided to make shrimp.  Kostas is at work so it was all Tony and me at home today.  And the easiest appetiser for keeping in track with the portions matter we talked before, is shrimp saganaki.  Saganaki refers to a type of pan used to prepare the food.  So basically you can have cheese saganaki, mussels saganaki, or in this case shrimp saganaki.  They are all cooked differently, but the sagani (the pan that they are cooked in) is the same.  Imagine a cast iron skillet that has two short handles on each side.  That's a sagani.  But you can use any frying pan or a cast iron skillet to cook the dish and then transfer it to a plate.  Shrimp saganaki is a typical meze eaten usually in the summer.  There are many ways one can prepare it.  With wine or ouzo.  With feta cheese or without.  Spicy or not.  But one thin is for sure:  needs lots of bread to eat it with!  Dip the bread in the sauce and mmmm yummy!  Always eat it when it comes out from the pan and usually served in the sagani itself.  
Enjoy this recipe and make it as an appetiser to accompany your ouzo if you like it or your white wine.
Kali Oreksi!
Dia, Kostas and Tony 

Shrimp saganaki

Ingredients for 2 people:

• 240g or 10 pieces of medium size shrimp deveined, head attached
• 30ml extra virgin olive oil
• 75g chopped onions
• 1 tsp crushed garlic
• 150g tomato sauce
• 1/2tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/2 tsp green, or more depending gone the heat you like, chilly pepper sliced thinly
• 2 pieces star anise
• 1 tbs parsley chopped
• 230ml water
• 50g feta cheese (optional)

for more information on how to make the shrimp saganaki please click here

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