Product Description

This is the year "It's Greek to me" becomes the happy answer to what's for dinner. My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the upcoming epic Troy, the 2004 Summer Olympics returning to Athens--and now, yet another reason to embrace all things Greek: The Olive and the Caper, Susanna Hoffman's 700-plus-page serendipity of recipes and adventure.

In Corfu, Ms. Hoffman and a taverna owner cook shrimp fresh from the trap--and for us she offers the boldly-flavored Shrimp with Fennel, Green Olives, Red Onion, and White Wine. She gathers wild greens and herbs with neighbors, inspiring Big Beans with Thyme and Parsley, and Field Greens and Ouzo Pie. She learns the secret to chewy country bread from the baker on Santorini and translates it for American kitchens. Including 325 recipes developed in collaboration with Victoria Wise (her co-author on The Well-Filled Tortilla Cookbook, with over 258,000 copies in print), The Olive and the Caper celebrates all things Greek: Chicken Neo-Avgolemeno. Fall-off-the-bone Lamb Shanks seasoned with garlic, thyme, cinnamon and coriander. Siren-like sweets, from world-renowned Baklava to uniquely Greek preserves: Rose Petal, Cherry and Grappa, Apricot and Metaxa.

In addition, it opens with a sixteen-page full-color section and has dozens of lively essays throughout the book--about the origins of Greek food, about village life, history, language, customs--making this a lively adventure in reading as well as cooking.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #34104 in Books
• Published on: 2004-08-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 608 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Traditional Greek cuisine favors sour tastes: lemons, capers, vinegar, wild herbs. Cooking with these pungent ingredients takes a sure hand or, failing that, a good recipe. Hoffman's book supplies the latter in abundance; it attempts nothing less than to capture the whole of Greek food culture between covers. That includes side notes on language, myth, literature and botany; details of regional specialties; lists of native greens; and an explanation of why we say "Greek" instead of "Hellenic." Like many warm-weather cuisines, Greek food relies on an abundance of grilled meats and fish and dressed greens. Hoffman presents them in dazzling variety, alongside familiar exports like Dolmadakia (stuffed grape leaves) and Tzatziki. Hoffman, an anthropologist and cook, includes recipes that might be challenging or improbable for American home cooks: Retsina-Pickled Octopus, Thyme-Fed Snails and "Greek-inspired ice creams" made with mastic or olive oil. There are labor-intensive recipes, too, showing how to make filo pastry and homemade sourdough noodles. Desserts—Semolina Custard Pie; Yogurt Cake with Ouzo-Lemon Syrup—go far beyond Baklava. With its fascinating trove of information, this work will please armchair cooks and traveling foodies. For those willing to surrender to its searingly bright palate of flavors, it's a boon to the kitchen, too. Photos, illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author
Susanna Hoffman, alumnus of the Chez Panisse restaurant and co-founder of Oakland's Good & Plenty Café, is a co-author of The Well-Filled Microwave Cookbook and Good & Plenty: America's New Home Cooking. She is an anthropologist and cook who has lived and worked in Greece on and off for more than thirty years, dividing her time between Telluride, CO, and Santorini, Greece.

Customer Reviews

Easy and Very, Very Good
I'm now at the age at which I feel that if I'd known I was going to live this long I would have taken better care of myself. Purchasing this book, and others like it, is one of the steps I'm taking to do just that.

So far the book is a great success. I've only made two of the recipes, but each has been easy and very good. I've got a list of about six more dishes that I'll cook in the next couple of weeks, which puts "The Olive and the Caper" head and shoulders above the other Mediterranean cookbooks I've recently bought.

Aside from the recipes, the book is great fun to read, chock-full of information about Greece and its culture of food.

No regrets here. Can't wait for the weekend so I can crack it open again.

Could not have been any better!
I can hardly put this beautiful book down!! It is soooo interesting, and full of history -- reading it takes me back to my wonderful visit to Greece. The recipes are fabulous and very authentic...I was very surprised. Fast service and an incredible buy. Thanks ever so much for selling it to me. Sky

An excellent read + tasty recipes to boot!
I checked this book out at the library and it had everything I love in a cookbook - lots of food and periodic history, interesting anecdotes, pretty pictures and tasty recipes. Love it!